Track Has a History of Derailments

Investigators examined twisted track and overturned passenger cars Wednesday to figure out why an Amtrak train derailed as it passed through a swamp, killing one person and injuring nearly 60 others.

The City of New Orleans, en route to Chicago, jumped the tracks Tuesday night near Flora. Its cars tumbled five or six feet off a trestle about 25 miles north of Jackson.

Mark Rosenker, vice chairman of the National Transportation Safety Board, would not speculate on the cause but said the FBI had examined the scene and found no reason to believe it was anything but an accident.

Amtrak, freight railroads and mass transit systems are operating at heightened alert following last month’s Madrid commuter train bombings. A law enforcement advisory last week warned of potential plots against U.S. subway and rail networks this summer. There have been bomb threats against two Amtrak trains in recent weeks.

The area has a history of derailments, and passenger Iris Giorgi said she heard a conductor say, “This is the worst part of the track,” as the wheels screeched and the passenger cars rattled. Minutes later, Giorgi, a nurse from Glendora, Calif., was helping to tend the injured.

Four freight trains have crashed on the 5-mile stretch near Flora since 1994. One, in 1997, was carrying hazardous chemicals, and 4,000 residents had to be evacuated.

The train was operating on tracks owned by the Canadian National/Illinois Central Railroad, a unit of Montreal-based Canadian National Railway Co. The track has a maximum speed of 79 mph, but Amtrak officials do not think the train was going that fast.

Safety board investigators planned to collect blood and urine samples from the engineer and crew members to test for drugs and alcohol.

Most of the injured were treated and released. One remained hospitalized in critical condition.

It was Amtrak’s first passenger death since 2002, when an auto train derailed in Florida, killing four passengers and injuring more than 150 people.

Investigators will examine the locomotive’s data recorder for information on speed and mechanical performance of the train. They also want to know whether there was a radio transmission from the engineer to dispatchers before the derailment.