Most of Amtrak’s Speed Fleet Won’t Make Holiday

Despite round-the-clock repair work, Amtrak enters the long Labor Day weekend--traditionally one of its busiest--with more than half its high-speed Acela Express fleet still out of service.

Seven of the trains will be available to carry passengers in Amtrak’s Northeast Corridor over the holiday weekend, compared with 15 on a normal day, Amtrak spokesman Cliff Black said Thursday. The passenger railroad will continue to press additional conventional trains into duty.

Amtrak began this week with five of the high-speed trains in service and added two on Wednesday. The seven trains made a total of 23 departures from Boston, New York and Washington on Thursday, compared with 50 on a typical weekday.

Temporary repairs continue on cracks discovered on and near shock-absorbing assemblies that keep the locomotives from swaying at high speeds.

The cause of the cracking, and a permanent fix for the trains, remain the subject of talks among Amtrak, federal railroad officials and the companies that built the trains, Montreal-based Bombardier Transportation of North America and Alstom Ltd. of France.

For now, the trains that have returned to service are undergoing an intensified inspection and repair program. “We are seeing new cracking on some pieces of equipment, and what we do then is simply repair them,” Black said.

Ultimately, Amtrak will need to rotate the trains back out of service for permanent repairs. If certain assemblies broke loose, they could damage or derail a moving train.

Acela Express is Amtrak’s premier service, capable of reaching 150 mph and offering comforts not found on other Amtrak trains. It’s also an important moneymaker for Amtrak, which has struggled financially throughout its three-decade existence.

If there was a silver lining for Amtrak, it was that the Acela Express problem was discovered in August, a slow time for business travel. But now, the repair work is stretching through a busy travel weekend and into September.

Another potentially important upcoming day for Amtrak service is Sept. 11, the anniversary of the terrorist attacks. Several major airlines say they are cutting back their flights based on weak bookings that day.

Amtrak owns 18 Acela Express trains.