‘Black Box’ Recorder Is Recovered From Derailed Train

A “black box” recorder that may provide clues to the fatal derailment of a 49-car freight train in the Cajon Pass was recovered by federal safety officials Friday as firefighters worked to extinguish smoldering fires in the twisted wreckage.

But the hazardous chemicals that had fueled the flames and sent noxious fumes boiling into the air burned themselves out, reducing the blaze and allowing the California Highway Patrol to reopen nearby Interstate 15, the busy freeway between Los Angeles and Las Vegas, early Friday afternoon.

Federal investigators hope to learn more about what caused Thursday’s derailment of the Burlington Northern-Santa Fe train through analysis of data from the recorder, which was retrieved from the mangled wreckage of the lead locomotive.

The device was found relatively intact, according to Alan Pollock, spokesman for the National Transportation Safety Board. But he said initial attempts to download the data into a computer brought to the crash site were unsuccessful.

The recorder, which stores information on the train’s speed, throttle settings and brake settings, was being flown to the safety board’s laboratory in Washington, where experts will endeavor to pick its electronic brain.

“We’re not yet sure how good the readings are,” Pollock said.

Data from the recorder could help explain why the train careened off its tracks along a curving stretch of the treacherous downhill grade that divides the San Gabriel and San Bernardino mountains, killing two of its three crew members.

The safety board also is seeking copies of radio communications between the crew and the railroad’s dispatch center, Pollock said. There are unconfirmed reports that crew members radioed frantically that the train was accelerating out of control and that they were preparing to jump.

Railroad officials confirmed Friday that the two bodies discovered alongside the wreckage were those of the train’s conductor and trainman, but declined to identify them or the 42-year-old engineer, who remained hospitalized with back injuries.

San Bernardino County Deputy Coroner Carl Morrow said Friday that one of the dead men had been identified as the conductor, Gilbert Louis Ortiz, 25, of Fullerton. Morrow said the second victim would not be identified before today at the earliest.

While the conductor and trainman apparently jumped from the train, the engineer remained at the throttle. He was pulled from the cab by three men who braved the fire and fumes to rescue him.

Several hundred nearby residents were evacuated, and Interstate 15, which normally carries about 100,000 vehicles a day, was closed for about 34 hours, forcing frustrated travelers to seek detours of 100 miles or more.

Railroad officials said the more than 100 freight trains that normally course through the Cajon Pass each day were either delayed or rescheduled because of the derailment. Full service is expected to resume by Monday, a railroad spokesman said.

Friday, more than 36 hours after the predawn crash, the wreckage continued to burn, stoked by freight cars filled with plastics, wood and tires.

Hamstrung by the absence of piped water, firefighters from the California Department of Forestry had to rely on foam and more than 100,000 gallons of water brought in by tank trucks to battle the blaze and cool the red-hot debris.

Lingering fingers of flame and smoke continued to swirl about the wreckage Friday, and safety board investigators from Los Angeles and Washington were able to conduct only a cursory inspection of the crash site, Pollock said.

Michael Martino, the safety board’s investigator in charge, said Friday night that the tracks in the Cajon Pass had been checked the day before the accident. “No anomalies” that might have led to the derailment were found at that time, he said. A further inspection is planned after the wreckage is cleared away.

Martino said investigators will interview the engineer today.

The crash occurred in the same area where a runaway Santa Fe freight train slammed into a parked coal train in December 1994. Crew members aboard both trains jumped to safety, but two were injured.

In 1989, a runaway Southern Pacific freight train careened down a parallel track in the Cajon Pass at more than 100 mph before plunging over an embankment into a tract of homes near San Bernardino, killing two crew members and two boys. Three more people were killed in the neighborhood two weeks later when a gasoline line, weakened by the crash, exploded.