Was The Derailed Amtrak Train Hit By An Object?

Another potential nail in the disgusting Blamestorming from Democrats

(WRAL/AP) The Amtrak train that derailed along the nation’s busiest tracks may have been struck by an object in the moments before it crashed, investigators said Friday, raising new questions about the deadly accident.

National Transportation Safety Board member Robert Sumwalt said an assistant conductor aboard the train told investigators that she heard the Amtrak engineer talking over the radio with an engineer for a regional railroad just before the crash.

The regional engineer, who was in the same area as the Amtrak train, said his train had been hit by a rock or some other projectile. The conductor heard Brandon Bostian, who was at the Amtrak controls, say the same had happened to his train, according to Sumwalt.

The windshield of the Amtrak train was shattered in the accident but one area of glass had a breakage pattern that could be consistent with being hit by an object and the FBI is investigating, he said.

Sumwalt declined to speculate about the exact significance of a projectile, but the idea raised the possibility that the engineer might have been distracted, panicked or even wounded in the moments before the train left the rails at more than twice the speed limit along a sharp bend.

The above article briefly mentions that two other trains were hit with some sort of object. A CNN article describes this in a bit more detail, including a different train being hit by something that made a “loud boom”

Obviously, this is still all speculation, but, it might explain why the train sped up. Though it was still traveling 20 miles an hour too fast for the curve, and even exceeding the speed by 5mph could derail a train.

SEPTA trains traveling through the area — including one of the poorest and most violent parts of Philadelphia — have had projectiles thrown at them in the past, whether by vandals or teenagers, she said. It was unusual that the SEPTA train was forced to stop on Tuesday night.

Interestingly, this is also an area that heavily votes Democrat. Weird, eh? If they were hitting the trains with some sort of object, which sounds more like rocks or something similar rather than bullets, Democrats can think about how their policies created this situation.

The wreck has focused new attention on positive train control, a system that automatically brakes trains going too fast. It is installed on the tracks where the train derailed, but it had not been turned on because further testing was needed, Amtrak President Joseph Boardman said.

Huh. So, the system is there, just not on yet. I love how Democrats jump to conclusions in order to use a tragedy for political purposes, and then their disgusting narrative immediately starts to fall apart.

Crossed at Pirate’s Cove. Follow me on Twitter @WilliamTeach.

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