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Confidence Restored for Metro Riders One Week After Crash
posted 06/30/09 10:29 pm
ABC 7 News - Confidence Restored for Metro Riders One Week After Crash
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WASHINGTON - A week after the deadliest crash in Metro's history, local commuters are weighing in on whether or not they feel safe riding on the transit system.

With the sensors that have been tested working and most of the old Metro cars moved off the ends of the trains, some are still questioning if that is enough.

In the middle of Tuesday night's rush hour on the red line, at least one person who was directly involved in last week's crash says he's confident in the system.

Metro's red line had packed platforms and delays Tuesday, as authorities work around the clock to determine exactly what happened last Monday when trains collided and nine lives were lost.

"I was on the one that was hit. I went to the hospital with my shirt on a tourniquet victim. I am very familiar with the problem," said Frank Fitch, a Metro passenger.

Fitch clearly understood the problem with the system's older model 1000-series cars in which he had been sitting -- they crumple upon impact. Federal authorities had previously recommended the cars be replaced but the 1000-series make up a fourth of the fleet and Metro said it didn't have the money to do so.

ABC 7 News saw evidence of the alternative plan in action. Since Sunday, Metro says it has moved 80-percent of the older cars to the middle of its trains with the newer, more crashworthy series at the front and end of the trains.

After the NTSB discovered an anomaly in one of the sensors on the tracks that should have detected the oncoming train, #112 last week but did not, Metro has since checked 65-percent of the 3,000 circuits on its rails. So far, no other problems have been reported.

Still, some riders say that doesn't spark total confidence. "They just need to check the rest and tell us immediately because I don't like to be the last person to know," said one Metro rider.

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