Wreck of Amtrak #188: talking points from RWU

1. True
2. True
3. True. However, this locomotive engineer told NTSB investigators he was well rested and not fatigued.
4. Abso-positively-lutely. Amtrak has used "ghost codes" on the cab signal apparatus to alert locomotive engineers of impending speed restrictions. I thought the last time I rode the head end of a train on the NEC we received an alert at Frankford Jct. but that might have been on the westbound move toward Philly. In any case, ACSES is "backward compatible." Early versions of ACSES did not rely on digital data radio networks, but utilized "passive" transponder sets to enforce civil speed restrictions, hence the name Advanced Civil Speed Enforcement System. Important to find out if a transponder had ever been in place approaching this curve, and if it had been removed in preparation for the cut in of a new system.
5. When Ricky Lee Gates blew the stop signal at CP Gunpow in Chase, Md in 1987, causing the deaths of 16 people, he had another person in the cab with him. The history of US railroads is littered with the wrecks of trains where more than one person was in the cab.

RWU program recommendations:

1. Sure, but this takes time and effort. Additional wrecks are possible
2. Most railroads have sections of mixed service, passenger and freight. It does not make sense to limit the application of existing technology to passenger trains.
3. 188 had a qualified locomotive engineer and a qualified conductor. Amtrak operates all its revenue service with qualified locomotive engineers and qualified conductors
4. yes
5. Length and tonnage trains had nothing to do with this accident; DV; Chase, Md. Lac Megantic, the North Dakota, West Virginia Iowa, Texas, Oklahoma, wrecks; Metrolink's head on in Chatsworth-- etc. etc.
6. FRA is preparing a new regulation requiring exactly such programs
7. Such protections already exist in FRA's regulations governing railroads. It's the "good faith challenge" rule.

This is all fine, but Empire Logistics faces a challenge. The RWU program is little different than the "typical" trade union program. There's nothing in it that existing union bureaucrats will find objectionable. So how can EL "advance" or "move" the program beyond that limitation.

Here's a problem. There's a possibility, just, that this locomotive engineer was using a cellphone or other device when operating the train, a gross violation of safety regulations. It's way too late for RWU, but I would urge a little bit of caution on the part of EL, at least until that possibility is eliminated.

It's really tough to advance your argument if you load it into a wagon being driven by someone negligent, careless, or irresponsible.

Everything I'm seeing is that they're just checking his cell phone because they haven't figured anything else out. Seems weird to indicate there's more to that already.

Not weird. Given the number of overspeed/signal violation accidents that we know are attributable to cell phone use-- Chatsworth, Spain to name the two most terrible. There are several others that have led to collisions, derailments, but with less horrifying consequences. That's why we established the rules and regulations against cell phone use.

This locomotive engineer was an active participant on several "train buff" lists, chat rooms, etc. Call me cynical, but after 40 years in the business, of ordering trains to be stopped so I could remove intoxicated locomotive engineers out of the seat, of observing engineers reading the newspapers while operating trains, that's enough to make me very suspicious of the engineer's compliance with the rules regarding cell phones.

Maybe I'm wrong; maybe not. I just think that we're better off waiting before claiming that this engineer was fatigued, or needed another person in the cab, or is a "responsible person" who made a mistake and simply lost "situational awareness."

The point is--making the claims of fatigue, and 'human error' to support the "people over profits" program is going to look pretty lame if this individual turns out to have deliberately violated the safety regulation, and cell phone use is a deliberate violation.

And in truth, there isn't much to figure out here. No more than there was much to figure out at DV, in Spain, or at Chatsworth. Violating the operating rules gets people killed.

Damn Artesian, you sound like a boss.

Which side are you on? (seriously, as we've seen you represent the industry's interests in your columns in the trade rags).

Stopping single employee train crews is a class issue, identical to refinery workers demanding larger crews per shift, nurses demanding lower patient ratios, teachers demanding smaller class sizes, etc. Other people's lives are on the line in petroleum processing and health care industries too.

Are you opposed to workers attempting to stop redundancies?

Isn't like, efficiency vs. safety the age old capitalist imperative? I mean, there is an inherent drive to reduce the amount of labor necessary to produce the same number of goods, yes? That tends toward unsafety, when that's done via intensification of the labor process vs. applying new technology, but I think both can happen simultaneously. I mean, isn't it the case that new technology and regulations implemented over the last 30 years have reduced safety and maintained profit, but that they've also resulted in an intensification, however difficult to measure, of the labor-process re: individual workers?

(In other words, can't we both be right?!)

Hieronymous

Damn Artesian, you sound like a boss.

Which side are you on? (seriously, as we've seen you represent the industry's interests in your columns in the trade rags).

Stopping single employee train crews is a class issue, identical to refinery workers demanding larger crews per shift, nurses demanding lower patient ratios, teachers demanding smaller class sizes, etc. Other people's lives are on the line in petroleum processing and health care industries too.

Are you opposed to workers attempting to stop redundancies?

Reading comprehension apparently isn't your strong point, is it?

As I said, I am opposed to single person crews. I am opposed to single person crews for a number of reasons. Safety is not one of them.

What I do to earn a living is run railroads, design train control systems, organize operating rules and procedures that increase the safety and the efficiency of rail operations. I know a bit of what I'm talking about when it comes to the details of safe train operations. The line that RWU seems bent on pursuing is bullshit when it comes to safe train operations.

If that doesn't matter to you, that's fine. It matters to me.

Capitalism in the epoch we're living through deals with "labor relations" in the most ruthless manner (not that it always hasn't, but there were times when class struggle acted as a brake on these abuses). There are myriad reasons for this, but the lack of workplace struggle allows bosses to reign uncontested. In production, technical advances in transportation and communication have made the whole planet an inter-linked shop floor, from extractive industries to emporiums of consumption. The shifts in sites of production, distribution and consumption -- and the resulting changes in class composition -- have led to restructuring where the imperative is towards downsizing and intensification of work: fewer workers producing more (real domination, to use Marx's term). As Pennoid accurately points out this is "difficult to measure." It's nearly impossible to quantify alienation.

EDIT: Artesian claims to have once been a worker. This claim has never been verified.

Other changes to management techniques, globally, involve behavioral-based safety programs. Which simply translates to: blame the worker (for everything). This condition could only result from a lack of class struggle. These changes were aimed at making workplaces more "competitive" and "productive," but have resulted in significant increases in health and safety problems: i.e. repetitive strain injuries, stress, workplace violence, fatalities and other work-related injuries and illnesses.

How do railroads implement behavior-based safety programs? Rewards & prizes. As in, don't report an injury for a certain duration of time and win a fancy safety jacket, a wall clock, a wristwatch or a gift certificate. And to enforce this agenda, workers get disciplined -- or terminated -- simply for reporting injuries. There's also an agenda of collective-guilt, collective-punishment. So the game is to help management hide and deny risks and dangers.

To prove this, just look at the harassment and attacks railroads use against whistle-blowers (remember what happened to Karen Silkwood when exposing the bosses' lies around safety in another industry).

S. Artesian

Reading comprehension apparently isn't your strong point, is it?

Insults don't strengthen your argument.

My opposition to single person crews is based on the fact that it will increase the power of capital, decrease the number of workers, and further impoverish the class as a whole. That's my argument for opposing single person crews.

Safety? Every crew size reduction on railroads since 1982 has been accompanied by improvements in safety. Get rid of the cabooses. Install EOTs. For or against? The argument made by the unions then were not qualitatively different than the arguments of the RWU today: that the caboose was essential to train safety. Didn't turn out that way, did it?

The point? Don't argue safety when the issue is the class relations between labor and capital.

Remote control locomotive use? Single person operation? You want to argue safety as the objection? Good luck. Data (mostly) from Canada shows reductions in injuries, accidents, for RCL operations.

Please don't patronize me about how it was when I hired out and how it is now. With the "fun" being removed from working on the railroad. Having a drunk engineer operating the locomotive when I'm in the hump yard coupling up cars, having to adjust knuckles, and make air brake hoses isn't fucking fun. Never was.

So you're for safety, H? OK, you support the mandatory and random drug and alcohol testing programs of the railroads? Does RWU?

And a locomotive engineer who shows up drunk to operate a train... Should he or she be removed from service in order to protect the safety of the employees, passengers, etc? What do you say? What does RWU say? And who is supposed make that determination? The employee's peers? Doesn't work that way in the real world.

I think that RWU's support for safety, and yours, is conditional; that is as long as you think it supports your notion of class action, of anti-capitalism, you're for it. If it doesn't, well then you'll be reconsidering.

I say don't use "safety" as a stalking horse when your real issues are something else.

Your position and that of the RWU is essentially nothing but a recapitulation of "economism," it's economism masked behind "safety."

Train length and weight are "unsafe." Where's the data for that? Nowhere, that's where. So another problem is that when you appear in a public forum and make that claim, anybody with a brain and 2 years experience with railroads will make you look like a fool. Good for class struggle you think?

Like I said, all you're doing is arguing for economism and pretending that's class struggle.

Workers get disciplined or fired for simply reporting injuries? I wouldn't say "nobody" gets disciplined simply for "reporting injuries" or unsafe conditions, but indeed the railroad will investigate the causes for injuries and make a determination as to the cause.. Do you or RWU have any data on how many of those reporting injuries have received formal discipline? I don't have that data for the industry, but I know on the railroads where I worked it was a distinct minority. Is that process abused? It is. I've seen managers target individuals. And I've seen labor union personnel coach employees into falsely claiming injury where there was none. I can document both types of abuse. I'd feel a whole lot better if you could document your claims, or the claims of RWU.

If you think "safety economism" is the way forward, well good for you. You keep on keepin' on. But you'll be going nowhere, and not very fast.

This is much like the situation with J.D. and Aufhebengate. Artesian makes his living protecting the extraction of surplus value by our class enemy -- in the process becoming a class enemy. You can bleat on and on and on about safety -- quoting statistics ad nauseam -- but it still doesn't change the fact that you consciously chose to be on the wrong side of the class line. This shows.

By the way, since becoming the boss (decades ago, right?) how many workers have you fired?

And, once again, insults do nothing to bolster your pro-management ideology.

By the way, since becoming the boss (decades ago, right?) how many workers have you fired?

I removed employees from service if they have acted in a manner that jeopardizes the safety of themselves or others. Then a formal hearing is conducted. The determination to dismiss in all capacities is made at the VP-O level.

I can give you some examples.

2 engineers for tampering with and disabling a safety device
1 engineer for operating a train with 700 passengers on it stinking drunk
1 engineer for operating through a red signal into the path of train, causing a collision
1 conductor for backing his train into the side of another, violating a stop signal.
1 engineer for physically assaulting another employee
1 conductor for sexually assaulting a female passenger
etc. etc.etc.

I'd ask you what you think should be done, but you of course would never be in such a position to have to make that decision. That's the whole thing. You pretend you have some insight into safety. In reality, you don't have the slightest idea what you're talking about.

This is kinda pointless. Since you're the management guru, whatever you say is right and whatever I say is wrong.

I don't think anyone on libcom envies you having to uphold the [wrong] class line.

I'm not looking for approval, least of all from a character like you. I make no apologies for what I did. Never hid it. Made things a bit safer; certainly safer than how I found them.

Being characterized by you as a class enemy is really irrelevant.

Once again, insults. Grow up.

And you're a bold-faced liar. You hid your status as a boss until this thread.

Granted, you've been pretty transparent about being a Lambertist Trotskyite, but -- thankfully -- you've finally come clean and admitted that you spew the management line about railroad workers. Your concern about safety is simply cover.

I don't even know what a Lambertist Trotskyite is. But I do know a poser when I see one, and you're one.

My concern with safety is a cover? That's hilarious.

You feel safe when you take Amtrak or Caltrain? Ask yourself why.

Removed by H.

I have more sympathy with Artesian's position than with Hieronymous.

We aren't saints offering colleagues unqualified support for what is in the end anti-social behaviour.

Just how many of us have worked alongside colleagues who are lazy sods, who leave the burden of work on the shoulders of others by not pulling their weight, giving other co-workers with the chore of covering up their failings to protect them by working twice as hard, ourselves. Eventually we leave them to face the shit of their own making and let them face the consequences.

I'm not talking about the informal nature of workers helping one another out but simple fact that we sometimes work with fucking arseholes who take advantage of that camaraderie and offer none in return.

....i blame society, myself...but it doesn't really help when you have that type of personality in the work-place spoiling it for the rest of us...

So we need managers, like Artesian, to bring the whip down to make us more honest, disciplined and efficient workers, right? They're necessary to prevent us from betraying our co-workers. Only the boss can make us pull our own weight.

Ajjohnstone, have your co-workers been worse than your bosses? If so, you live world much different than the rest of us.

What's fucked up about Artesian's assertions is that he's profiling Brandon Bostian so as to establish his guilt. It's like he's cross-examining the guy's lawyer and pointing out all the lies (his cellphone wasn't in his grip as his attorney claims, but he was really actually using it -- which we know because Artesian says so). The only problem is that this is pure speculation, tinged with Artesian's pro-management bias.

I'll stand by what RWU said: "there is the possibility that we may never know" the cause. So we should mourn the loss of life, without pretending that we are omniscient.

have your co-workers been worse than your bosses? If so, you live world much different than the rest of us

.

Actually, yes some have been excellent bosses that i was only too happy to work for...more knowledge, more experience, and willing to share skills and even expend some sweat helping out. (one particular boss, we would usually end up standing back and letting him do all the work but we all drank with him too) Over the years i have had good bosses and evil bosses as well as good colleagues and shit ones. In other jobs i had i have encountered the same situation.

i do differentiate between line managers and middle management against the higher levels of managers but i was in an industry that at one time had no direct entrants to management and all managers had to come up from the bottom, a lengthy career ladder.

We had job and finish and the more you stuck in the sooner you all went home or longer your breaks were...and as i said, some let others do the graft but took the benefits.

That did end, outside managers were introduced and they also began to fast-track certain workers into supervisory roles...ie to be disciplinary overseers, and they were usually the same lazy sods willing to lay on the whip for more money, quite often the exact same persons identified as mercenary parasites that the union had sometimes even previously defended from dismissal. But as I said, other bosses went about their duties and gained my respect and sadly some of them were shafted by the beforementioned.

And the world i lived in was much the same as many others. And believe it or not, i often was a shill for my industry, arguing that we performed a worthwhile public service (and should be rewarded accordingly)........but that all changed as i said.

My job as the boss was to make sure all trains went from A to...wherever, and back again as scheduled without anybody getting hurt. That's what it was in a nutshell. It was a management job, not covered by labor agreements. Indeed, I did it for the money, although the incomes of most locomotive engineers, a good section of the conductors, most train dispatchers were greater than mine.

Did I like the job? Absolutely. I enjoyed the responsibility, making decisions, solving the problems, and making sure all the trains went as scheduled without anyone getting hurt. I enjoyed figuring out why trains derailed and removing and/or mitigating the causes. I liked reducing the risk in the operation whether that risk came from track geometry, rolling contact fatigue, or human error.

This may come as a surprise, but human error is the single greatest cause of train accidents. I liked designing and implementing systems that reduced that human error. All of this requires execution, and yes enforcement. Otherwise people get killed. Nobody got killed following my instructions in 30 years of railroad management.

I was able to make real changes in train control systems that reduced violations, and potentials for accidents. I think was able to make a real difference in the training, qualification, and supervision of operating crews. That's what the numbers showed. That's what the general chairman of the (then) UTU told me.

In that process I confronted the fact that certain people should not be allowed to operate in safety-sensitive positions. I confronted those people in both management and in the organized crafts. I did everything I could to have those people, in both management and the rank and file, removed from those positions.

The situation is necessarily adversarial. Unions are obligated to defend and protect all their members equally, regardless of performance, or responsibility. Every employee is a "good employee," hard-working, responsible, until.....until he or she isn't. Until it turns out, that he or she's been tampering with the safety devices (like the 'deadman' or alerter features on the brakes, which automatically stops the train if the employee becomes incapacitated) for months, until this one time, some supervisor was on the train and observed the employee tampering.

During those 30 years, I witnessed, and participated in, the programs that produced a 10 fold drop in train accidents, the drop in employee fatalities and injuries. There were several critical components that produced that decline, all of which required implementation, execution, follow-up by operating officers, "bosses."

As for profiling......I could care less if somebody is a "rail buff" and is on Facebook or Twitter or loves to discuss trains in internet chat rooms. However, when a train accelerates into a reduced speed area, and maintains that acceleration until the locomotive engineer suddenly realizes where he or she is at and "dumps" the train-- putting into emergency braking-- and the engineer tells investigators he has "no memory" of anything that happened after he left 30th Street Station; that he was not fatigued; the most likely explanation for the accident is that the locomotive engineer, unless deliberately negligent, was distracted-- distracted as the engineer in Chatsworth, California was; distracted as the train driver in Spain was; distracted as the engineer on Metro-North was (if you look at the event recorder data of that engineer's previous runs, he committed overspeed violations on 2/3 of his trips. Leads me to discount the "sleep apnea"/ fatigue explanation offered by the NTSB).

While it might be so much more class conscious to claim that this locomotive engineer was the victim of railroads trying to reduce costs; of railroads' callousness toward safety; of this or that-- the problem is in tying a "political program" such as RWU's to the actions of an individual; using that action as a justification or a proof of the correctness of the program, when in fact the actions of the individual reflect nothing about such a program, and in fact might be explained by something else that is contrary to the program.

Anybody remember the collision in Chase, Md. in 1987? Where the locomotive engineer had disabled the cab signal alerter so the whistle wouldn't bother him while he watched TV when operating his locomotives? While stoned? Anybody know about this locomotive engineer's work record? Or how about Livingston, La 5 years earlier; where the locomotive engineer, drinking his beer, had his girlfriend, IIRC, operate the train a bit too fast around the curve derailing tank cars carrying hazardous materials, resulting in the evacuation of thousands of people? That engineer had been allowed to return to service after a previous serious offense. So..."profiling" such that it is might have saved some lives in those instances.

I'd point out that such very capitalist countries like Japan and France have operated high speed rail for decades without fatal train derailments due to employee error. It takes money, commitment, and it takes supervision. The point being the issue of safety is not an exclusively "socialist" issue, disregarded by capitalist managers and bosses. Capitalist countries can and do run extraordinarily safe rail operations.

Removed by H.

All of the above, H. Taser, Pinkerstons, National Guard, Kickbacks.

As for Rosemont's "friend." Hey, that's when I was a bona fide union member, a mere rank and filer, so you get no points for that one. Not that it matters. Rosemont's "friend," broke into the apartment of a friend of mine after we had both left Rosemont's group because we were sick of the necrophilia. This "friend" of Rosemont, accompanied by another goon, attacked my friend, a gentle soul, unlike myself, who would never use a taser, an iron pipe, or other weapon to defend himself. Unlike myself. So I, accompanied by another, paid this fuck back in kind and in spades.

One more thing I'm proud of.

Good to see you aligning yourself with goons like Rosemont's "friend" who found his way into the NCLC where he was at home with other goons.

Priceless.

removed by H.

Who is Rosemont's friend?

Can we please avoid this stuff getting personal? It's been interesting watching the discussion on these issues and I really don't want to have to watch because they need to be heavily moderated, rather than watch because they are informative.

I agree that this oddly personal 'railroadgate' portion of the thread is distracting but it has been fascinating to watch.

As someone who has seen management repeatedly pin the fault of such and such an injury on operator error when clearly the danger had to do with the work environment / process (repetitive actions on production machines), I'm sort of knee-jerk uncomfortable with S. Artesians entire posture. There is no real acknowledgement of railroad workers struggle for safer railroads over the years. It goes further with some awkward positioning of unions as some sort of intrinsic barrier to managements benevolent intentions (?)

Sorry for derailing.

I spent several hours walking picket lines in solidarity with refinery workers during the USW strike a few months back. Then I got to talk with a half dozen refinery workers, from both Southern and Northern California, at the railroad safety conference in Richmond, CA on March 14th. What struck me is that one of the most dangerous areas of the refinery was the rail yard, where union railroad employees often jump out of the cab and certified locomotive engineers employed by the refinery jump in and take the train to be loaded or unloaded (this was the case at Tesoro in Martinez, CA). A woman doing the latter told me the gory details of seeing a fellow worker get crushed to death by a tank car during this process.

Sure, these were all militants, but none of them took safety lightly. Every-fucking-single conductor or engineer at the conference had hit a vehicle at a railroad grade crossing. All due to human error when the car or truck made a mistake, got stuck, or tried to go around the crossing gate or did something else foolish. There were 25 railroaders in that room, and all bore the psychological scars of these accidents -- including, at the most extreme, PTSD. The whole point of the conferences in Richmond and Olympia was safety, focusing on the energy supply chain.

Here's the research on Train Crew Fatigue that was discussed at the conference (again, the whole purpose of which was the safety of workers and the planet):

Fighting Fatigue in the Rail Industry

Medical Literature Review on Rail Worker Conditions

The Effect of Fatigue on Railroad Worker Health & Safety

Work Schedules & Sleep Patterns of Rail Workers

RWU Crew Fatigue Resolution from 2008

Artesian obviously has lots of experience, having worked in this industry from both sides of the class line. If he has any skin in the game at all, he could share information that would help rank-and-filers be more safe, that could also be grounded in class struggle demands for better conditions overall (and for all industrial workers, not just railroaders; this is what safety educators like Nancy Lessin does with the United Steelworkers' Tony Mazzocchi Center and Health, Safety and Environment). That can't happen if he puts on his manager hat and patronizingly talks down to the stupid worker, lecturing RWU about what he claims to be its insincerity.

The railroad sisters and brothers in RWU are not only comrades, but many are friends. Their "program" is unity among the 13 separated rail craft unions and non-union, contracted-out sectors (like van drivers) in the U.S. and Canada. They have fraternal relations (based on face-to-face interactions, like at their biannual convention) to build internationalist solidarity with militant railroaders in Korean Railway Workers' Union, Doro-Chiba (National Railway Motive Power Union of Japan), Réseau Rail Sans Frontière in France (Network Rail Without Borders, who are doing what RWU is attempting to do, but in Europe and Africa), and industrial workers worldwide (like Union of Hong Kong Dockers), but especially all other workers along supply chains.

I would be more than happy to share with workers' organization, caucus, railroad or otherwise, etc. my thoughts on how to advance the struggle.

Anybody who wants to know the details of Franklin Rosemont's Surrealist Goon can contact me via email off list. It was a moment of righteous retribution which I am only too happy to share with others.

Every locomotive engineer I know has struck some of vehicle at a grade crossing, or had someone jump in front of the train. These are real issues, as is crew fatigue, but I'm not sure these issues take us to some sort of class struggle program within railroads-- grade crossings for example are regulated by state laws, and a national code for traffic regulation at crossings. We can argue for quadrant gates, or solid barriers (as are used in Europe), and we can say, as we can say about everything "Capitalism doesn't want to pay for it" but I'm not sure that gets anyone very far. Or we can participate in programs that will essentially bring management, labor, and law enforcement "together"-- like affixing cameras to railroad crossings to photograph the license plates of cars running the crossing, so that fines can be assessed, but...you see what I mean.

Fatigue is a critical issue, with less significance on commuter and passenger lines than freight. But again, much of this can be addressed without calling into question the basis of capitalist production. BNSF, for example, now allows road crews operating freight trains to request "rest time" will handling the train, with the dispatcher arranging to put the train in a siding for 30 minutes or an hour and the crew can nap.

I think the critique has to be broadened a bit; to talk about the relentless downsizing of rail labor and the fact this is part of an overall assault on the class as a whole-- shrinking the number of stable, living wage jobs.

If I were to recommend beginning a program, I would agitate against wage differentials-- not just within a craft ("step wages"), but among all workers. There's no reason why a locomotive engineer should be paid more than a track worker, except from the capital standpoint that there is more time invested in the training of the locomotive engineer. But to workers, time is time, and all should be compensated at the highest going rate. I don't know that that would gain much traction with the locomotive engineers, conductors, or train dispatchers, but I sure do think it would create solidarity among all the workers.

But maybe that's just me, speaking from my bureaucratic, enemy of the class perspective. You make the call.

S. Artesian

Train length and weight are "unsafe." Where's the data for that?

Wall Street Journal (February 5, 2014) "Lawsuits Shine Spotlight on Railcar Safety: Railroads Charge Faulty Repair Work Led to Several Derailments," bringing up not only the safety dangers of outsourcing, but also how increasing weights on coal cars operated continuously create derailment risks as their Class F axles wear out and fail:

[quote=WSJ]Raymond Hasiak, a Union Pacific lawyer, argued in a federal-district court in Omaha last June that repair firms like Progress Rail take on the role of "gatekeeper," determining which wheels and axles are safe to continue using. "Everybody depends upon them to look at the axles and determine this is an axle that is appropriate to be put back into service," Mr. Hasiak said, adding that "the safety of all the rails in North America [is] dependent upon this."

A lawyer for Progress Rail, Michael Coyle, said the company wasn't responsible for the derailments cited in the lawsuit and had carefully followed procedures mandated by the Association of American Railroads, a trade group. "We do it exactly the way the American Association of Railroads…tells us how to do it," Mr. Coyle said.

In the Omaha court case, Union Pacific sued Progress Rail for about $5 million in damages arising from two derailments of trains hauling coal, one in DeWitt, Iowa, in July 2007 and another near Martin Bay, Neb., in January 2010. In the latter derailment, Union Pacific's Mr. Hasiak told the jury, 33 railcars were "ripped up and thrown all over the landscape." Neither derailment resulted in injuries.

In both cases, Union Pacific alleged that Progress Rail failed to inspect and refurbish axles properly before returning them to service, resulting in axle breakdowns that knocked the trains off the rails.

Progress Rail's Mr. Coyle told the jury the railcars' axles wore out partly because they were supporting weights greater than they were designed to handle. The derailments, he said, had "nothing to do with anything that Progress Rail did."

A jury returned a verdict in favor of Progress Rail last June. Union Pacific has appealed that decision.

During the trial, the two sides argued over whether railroads were allowing too much weight to be put on so-called Class F axles. Those axles were designed to support 263,000 pounds. In the early 1990s, though, railroads began using them for weights of as much as 286,000 pounds as a way to carry more freight.

"They took [color=#FF0000]axles that were forged in the '70s and they decided that, okay, they're designed for 263,000 pounds, let's increase it to 286,000 pounds[/color]," Mr. Coyle of Progress Rail told the Omaha court.

[color=#FF0000]A 2006 report from the Transportation Technology Center, an arm of the Association of American Railroads, found that there was a "significant increase" in failures of Class F axles carrying the heavier loads beginning in the early 2000s.[/color]

Along with putting more weight on the axles, the railroads were using railcars more intensively, leaving them idle less often, the report found, adding: "Coal cars see nearly continuous operations." At the same time, the report said, railroads had outsourced more of the repair and maintenance of railcars, and ownership of many railcars had shifted from railroads to leasing companies, electric utilities and others. "It is likely that all of these combined factors have contributed something to the increased number of accidents related to axles," the report said.[/quote]

Read it again, H. This is an issue involving using the proper axles for the loads to be carried. Yes, there was a significant increase in axle failures from carrying loads above the design spec.

So a) this has nothing to do with train length and b) nothing to do with overall train weight.

Reducing the gross tonnage and overall length that any train hauls says, and does, nothing about complying with design specs.

A train of 50 cars, with each car loaded at 140 tons when the axles are rated for 120 tons, is not safer than a train of 200 cars with each car loaded to axle spec at 120 tons.

The RWU program calls for limiting overall train lengths and weights, not insuring that cars are not loaded beyond their specs.

Do shippers load cars beyond their specs, and do railroads accept the overloads in the drive to reduce costs and increase the capital animated by the living labor? Absolutely. This is capitalism.

Do railroads compromise safety in the attempt to maximize profits? As I've already pointed out, of course they do. This is capitalism. Everything railroads do is a compromise between safety and efficiency. This is capitalism. And everything a railroad does under any mode of production will involve some sort of compromise between safety and efficiency. That's the physics of objects in motion. That's how we design systems to mitigate risk. The difference with socialism will be the compromise will be made on the basis of the greater needs of society; not on the basis of private accumulation.

The issues are, does arguing for reduced train lengths and reduced overall tonnage a) enhance safety b) speak to the needs of the class as a whole in the struggle against capitalism.

My answer to both is no. Incidents, accidents,injuries, derailments have steadily declined over the decades as overall train lengths and gross tonnage have increased. Doesn't mean railroads aren't capitalist. Doesn't mean they don't violate specs, or compromise safety. Does mean despite such violations and compromises, railroad safety has been dramatically improved.

IMO, the way RWU has presented the issue and its program leads logically and exclusively to demands for "better regulation;" "better oversight" by the government.

I think the most important task is to develop a program that does not lead, inevitably, to some sort of program leaving initiative in the hands of the government; that does not wind up as a legislative program calling for Congress to spend X to support Amtrak; or Congress to provide X $ for the implementation of PTC; or FRA to develop a new regulation. Doing that is the province of social democrats.

EDIT: I think the real issue in the WSJ piece is not so much the axle loads, but the outsourcing. There is the fundamental attack on labor, and there is where real strategy has to be developed. It's also the point where "improved regulation" programs, break down. Outsourcing has taken on some radical new dimensions with improvement of train control and communication technologies.

It is possible to separate completely, physically, organizationally, corporately, movement control offices from the railroad. You can dispatch trains in Egypt from and office in New York once the communication links are installed. And vice-versa.

Somehow, rather than reverting to "scope of work" arguments, a program has to be developed that unifies "on property" and outsource workers.

Artesian, thank you for your response.

But where does RWU say anything about "overall" weight on trains? You said that. Any situation that puts human beings at risk are opposed, not in some policy wonky way, but because people get killed.

And in all due respect, you refer to the RWU "program" but it's not clear if you're assuming that that's their position -- or you're simply inferring it from the piece they wrote about Amtrak in the original post -- or if you heard or read it somewhere. Please clarify.

Program, to me at least, implies organization and leadership and is the default position of the social-democratic-Leninist-left (ya know, "The historical crisis of mankind is reduced to the crisis of revolutionary leadership," p. 9 in Death Agony of Capitalism and the Tasks of the Fourth International [1938] by Leon Trotsky). Since RWU makes no pretenses to being a revolutionary organization, the point is moot.

When a cross-craft group in 13 unions (and a few more in Canada) and various non-union sectors in North America forms into a solidarity caucus, the purpose is to end the divide-and-conquer methods of management and the concessionary bargaining of union bureaucrats. To me, and speaking only for myself, it's the Chicago Idea -- the idea of class unity best expressed here:

Jame Green

The first sign of change came in March 1882, when a group of German tanners struck and demanded a wage equal to that of the more skilled English-speaking curriers. When employers refused the demand and the curriers struck in sympathy with the immigrant tanners… the curriers acted not on the basis of “any grievance of their own, but because of a sentimental and sympathetic feeling for another class of workmen.” The sympathy strike even surprised the editor of the of the trades council newspaper, who said it was “something new and wonderful.” The seventy-two-day exercise in solidarity was, according to the Illinois Bureau of Labor Statistics, “one of the most remarkable on record, an action “conducted on the principle of the Knights of Labor which proclaims that “an injury to one is the concern of all.” —James Green, Death in the Haymarket, p. 98

It's the same spirit that animated the American Railway Union, the Western Federation of Miners, the Industrial Workers of the World, the Stormy Petrel IAM/SWOC machinists and every struggle that generalized working class solidarity into mass strikes -- a.k.a. general strikes -- with sympathy actions flowing down commodity chains, whether they were the rails in 1877, 1894, and 1946, or at major trucking nodes like in Minneapolis in 1934, or maritime nodes like in 1934 when every West Coast was paralyzed for 83 days and after cops killed two workers, a general strike sparked by longshore workers shut down San Francisco for four days.

Railroaders are hamstrung by the Railway Labor Act (RLA), which restricts collective action (but actually doesn't prohibit secondary boycotts) in ways more restrictive than the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA). Hence after the tortuous 9-month contract negotiations this year and last between the Pacific Maritime Association (PMA; the collective of container carrier operators, marine terminal operators, shipping associations, and port associations) and the International Longshore & Warehouse Union (ILWU) for a contract for the 20,000 workers at 29 container ports on the Pacific coast, right-wingers in Congress are proposing putting longshore workers under the Railway Labor Act (here's a rabid conservative rant demanding that, called "Held Hostage"). The reason? To try to tame their powerful work rules, won in the 1934 San Francisco General Strike, that allowed an unofficial work-to-rule slowdown that brought the busiest ports, like LA/Long Beach and Oakland, to a grinding halt and resulting delays where containers sat idle on the docks for as long as 3 weeks. The capitalist production system operates on a just-in-time logic and this can't be tolerated. But the PMA and ILWU just finalized a 5-year contract that continues to lock in some of those gains for longshore workers into the future.

From the victory in 1934 until the first Modernization & Mechanization Agreement (allowing for the introduction of intermodal cargo containers) in 1960, the ILWU -- like the 9-year run of IWW Local 8 on the docks of Philly from 1913-1922 -- were the "Lords of the Docks." This allowed union control of hiring, dispatch and the work process. In 1934 the ILWU achieved gains like:

[quote=Stan Weir][The] final major control obtained by the West Coast longshoremen as a result of the 1934 award was the 2,100-pound load limit. No more than that amount of break-bulk cargo was allowed to be hoisted in or out of a hold at any one time on any sling, board, bridle, or net. Beyond being a safety measure, it became a major restriction on the employer's ability to conduct speedups.[/quote]

The ILWU were able to protect these gains with legal and illegal quickie strikes -- 1,399 of them from 1934 to 1948. So like the longshore workers, getting bosses to not overload train cars -- like allowing 286,000 in cars designed for 263,000 pounds -- is a practical demand of railroad workers. Heavy cars are at a greater risk of axle failure, so they are opposed. All unsafe operating conditions are opposed. RWU doesn't have the contractually guaranteed advantages of the ILWU, but if they are able to unite the rank-and-file in UTU and SMART and the other craft unions and non-union workers, they might be able to exercise similar power on the shopfloor. An ideal? Yes, but not impossible.

Although RWU doesn't claim this explicitly, it does makes sense that if DOT-111 unpressurized tank cars were designed for non-flammable liquids -- like corn syrup, wax and tallow -- they shouldn't be used to haul volatile chemicals like Bakken crude. Even the stronger 1232 tank cars -- also known as "DOT 111s with 5-mile-an-hour bumpers" -- are exploding during derailments. But since the ramping up of fracking, the number of DOT-111 used has gone up astronomically -- from 9,500 in 2008 to more than 400,000 in 2014. If it is conclusively shown that DOT-111 are unsafe to haul any volatile crude, this practice should stop.

Since the Clean Air Act of 1970 mandated lower sulfur coal to prevent acid rain, the use of Powder River Basin sub-bituminous coal has made it the biggest cluster of open pit mines in the world. The mines are accessed by way of the Orin Line, the busiest train line in the world with 4 tracks carrying at least 100 empty and full unit trains per day. Some are as long as 2 miles and weigh as much as 15,000 tons. If those 110+ cars are each overloaded -- beyond specs -- and this causes their Class F axles to fail, this practice of overloading should be discontinued.

Why are long trains opposed?:

1. Long and heavy trains create an unsafe situation for many reasons. It takes far more time and distance to slow or to stop such a train. And the longer and heavier the train, the more severe the “slack action,” thereby increasing the potential for a train break-in-two, emergency brake applications and derailments. In addition, the longer and heavier the train, the more severe the train wreck if and when such a train does derail. Long trains are more likely to have air brake problems, especially in cold and inclement weather. And all things considered, it is more difficult for the train crew to safely run, inspect, work, test, and otherwise operate such a train. Therefore, it follows that reducing train length and tonnage would undoubtedly result in an all around “risk reduction” for the train and its crew.

2. The longer and heavier the train, the greater likelihood of blocked road and pedestrian crossings, creating at best an inconvenience to the public, and at worst the inability to provide emergency services when crossings are blocked. In addition, blocked crossing in effect “train” motorists to “run the gates” in order to avoid being impeded for what might be long periods, resulting in grade crossing accidents and fatalities.

3. Long trains tend to increase the number of hours the train’s crew spends getting the train in and out of the terminal and over the road, making for exhausting tours-of-duty for train crews. The result is more crew fatigue, reduced situational awareness, more time at the away-from-home terminal, and a lower quality of work and home life for trainmen and engineers.

The demand that unsafe conditions be eliminated is to protect workers and fenceline communities. In April (the last month for which I could find statistics) at least 5 railroad workers were killed on the job. Human error or not, that's 5 workers too many. Artesian, you obviously can prove that over the last 30 years that's demographically a decrease. You're right, but it's still 5 workers too many.

Contrast this with workplace safety of the ILWU. They obviously have a stronger grievance procedure and in most cases, can shut the docks if something's unsafe. Likewise, if a longshore workers dies on the job -- for any reason -- all work stops for the day. Just look at any West Coast port at lunchtime; the entire process of stevedoring shuts down entirely. Is this inefficient, in the capitalist logic of moving goods? Fuck yes! But it comes out of class power from generations before, codified into contractual gains that have been preserved. ILWU longshore workers are rarely bullied by their bosses, which is something we should all aspire to.

But we should see the whole earth as the shopfloor and production as taking place in this supply chain-driven social factory as sectors blur in a just-in-time system of contracting and subcontracting across the planet. Then the need becomes solidarity that crosses all sectors along the commodity chain, be it workers extracting raw materials, transportation workers moving them by pipeline, truck, train, ship, barge or plane, then to processing and manufacturing, while transporting, loading and unloading them -- often intermodally -- along these global assembly lines, before they make it to the point of consumption -- having crossed borders, oceans and even continents -- and more and more frequently using the internet to coordinate deliveries right to our doorsteps. Solidarity actions need to go beyond the single regions characteristic of the Fordist Era and should be carried forward by the working class arrayed at these various these nodal points of the global supply chain.

Hieronymous

Any situation that puts human beings at risk are opposed, not in some policy wonky way, but because people get killed.

And let's not be anthropocentric. If we're anti-capitalists, how can we oppose capital's destructiveness to all life? And critique how capitalist production makes human life and the natural resources of the planet externalities? Certainly not by social-democratic reforms, which simply smooth the contradictions without changing a thing. Green factories, ecologically sound modes of production and electrified rail beget green prisons and different variations of the same alienated existence.

Here's a more lucid expression of the contradiction:

Will Barnes

The movement of capital, and the social and natural transformations it generates, are borne along by an objective logic whose outcome is necessarily the very destruction of the natural world in its autonomy, cohesion, and otherness, that is, in its abiotic coherence, as living, and as a presupposition of specifically human life.

How can struggles in the present avert damage like the recent Refugio Beach oil pipeline rupture and spill in Southern California, where a simple cut-off valve would had prevented the second massive oil spill in Santa Barbara Channel in 45 years? Plains All American Pipeline gamed the regulations, avoiding the local county ones by deferring to federal rules to cut costs on safety equipment and procedures. This shell game happens all the time, whether with occupational health and safety laws or other restrictions on ecological destruction.

This is a sincere question: how can class struggle incorporate ecological and human safety in a non-reformist way? (the only example that comes to mind are the petrochemical worker-militants at Porto Maghera in Italy in the 1960s & 1970s, but that was long ago)

(1) Here's what RWU wrote:

5 – Limiting the length and tonnage of freight trains to a reasonable and manageable level.

Length and tonnage of a train are cumulative. As I said a 3000 foot, 7000 ton train that has particular cars overloaded beyond design spec is not as safe as a 12,000 foot 15, 000 ton train where the loads comply with design spec.

(2) "program"--- excuse the choice of a catch-all word for policy, or discussion points, or suggestions, or demands, or advocacy. Whatever your ideological interpretation is, it's your ideological interpretation.

(3)quite agree with the class solidarity, which means that "program" or suggestions or demands must move beyond the craft, trade union level. I don't read that in the RWU material that's been reproduced here. I wish I saw something that attacked wage differentials for employees assigned to different functions, or even the same functions..

(4) re

So like the longshore workers, getting bosses to not overload train cars -- like allowing 286,000 in cars designed for 263,000 pounds -- is a practical demand of railroad workers.

Ypu said that. RWU did NOT say that. RWU said limit length and weight of trains [not cars] to a "reasonable" standard. So is a train made up of 60 cars a reasonable length? And if the cars each weigh 315,000 pounds when loaded, and are designed to handle that load, is that reasonable? Is a 150 car train a "reasonable length" when distributed power is used (placing remotely controlled locomotives at locations within the entire train to minimize draft forces ("slack action")?

(5)

Although RWU doesn't claim this explicitly, it does makes sense that if DOT-111 unpressurized tank cars were designed for non-flammable liquids -- like corn syrup, wax and tallow -- they shouldn't be used to haul volatile chemicals like Bakken crude. Even the stronger 1232 tank cars -- also known as "DOT 111s with 5-mile-an-hour bumpers" -- are exploding during derailments. But since the ramping up of fracking, the number of DOT-111 used has gone up astronomically -- from 9,500 in 2008 to more than 400,000 in 2014. If it is conclusively shown that DOT-111 are unsafe to haul any volatile crude, this practice should stop.

Absolutely, positively agree. DOT 111 and 111A tank cars should not be used to transport ethanol and fracked oil. Been saying that for years in my role as operating officer. However, railroads don't make that determination. US DOT does. For about 25 years, NTSB has been pointing out the failure rate of DOT 111 tank cars. DOT 111s should be prohibited from transporting flammable materials. But again RWU doesn't say that. You do. I do. NTSB does. Senator Schumer does. Wish RWU did.

(6)

Long and heavy trains create an unsafe situation for many reasons. It takes far more time and distance to slow or to stop such a train. And the longer and heavier the train, the more severe the “slack action,” thereby increasing the potential for a train break-in-two, emergency brake applications and derailments. In addition, the longer and heavier the train, the more severe the train wreck if and when such a train does derail. Long trains are more likely to have air brake problems, especially in cold and inclement weather. And all things considered, it is more difficult for the train crew to safely run, inspect, work, test, and otherwise operate such a train. Therefore, it follows that reducing train length and tonnage would undoubtedly result in an all around “risk reduction” for the train and its crew.

Not quite. What you're leaving out here is that in capitalism technology advances behind or sometimes ahead of the drive to accumulate. So, for example, with radio control technology, distributed power can put locomotives at various locations in the train, essentially breaking into 3 or 4 separate trains, all sharing a mechanical and pneumatic connection, but with distributed power "smoothing" the in-train forces so that derailments are no less likely from draft forces than for a shorter train.

Not quite. Software databases of the track geometry, speed conditions, etc. are loaded into many locomotives prior to departure. The engineer has a continuous graphic display that identifies areas that require specific applications of brake and throttle to maintain the "smoothness" of the in train forces.

Of course, railroad management seeks to develop this technology for reasons of profit and economizing. I believe GE's "trip optimizer" software is being rolled out that indicates precisely where, and how much, brake or throttle should be applied at any given location to a)comply with maximum authorized speeds and b) minimize train handling issues.

Not quite. Train separation, train stopping is based on calculations of safe braking distance-- where signal controls (essentially warnings, "previews" to the crew) are coded and spaced to reduce the speed of the train to ZERO from the MAXIMUM AUTHORIZED SPEED (MAS) given crew compliance with the timetable speed restrictions and the signal indications. We call this the "signal design distance: Therefore, if a longer heavier, train cannot comply with the signal design distance, then the maximum speed, and the intermediate allowable speeds when signals require slowing are REDUCED to comply with safe train separation, and the safe braking distance. Same principle that says passenger trains can go 100 mph on 100 mph track, but freight trains can only go 40 mph. Again, advanced train control technologies will enforce these speeds in the event of human error.

Does this mean that perhaps a 15,000 ton train operating at 30 mph can't stop if a car or a truck "runs" the grade crossing? Absolutely. But a 5000 ton train operating at 60 mph won't be able to stop either. The point isn't to stop the train, but to stop the vehicle from entering the crossing.

Not quite: If we abstract from physics, not considering peculiarities of terrain, and population density, and build up along the right of way, damage in a derailment is a function of energy. Energy is proportional to the weight of the train, but a function of the square of the velocity. Yes a 15,000 ton train at 30 mph will transmit more energy than a 6000 ton train at 30 mph, but not as much as a 6000 ton train at 60 mph. The point again is that defining a "reasonable length and weight" depends upon physics, upon technology, upon the advancement of knowledge which depends on experience.

Not quite: Long trains are subject to air problems in cold weather yes, which is why every Class 1 railroad has matrices of maximum train lengths and weights for specific temperature ranges. Railroads already limit train length in extreme weather conditions.

(7) Grade crossings: Yes, longer trains block grade crossings when the operate over the crossings, or when they are stopped. However, the particulars of adjusting train length to accommodate road crossing, and all the varying distances between road crossings would make for a Sisyphean task, given that a single train of the "correct length" can stop at any given point, not blocking a crossing, but the following train, again of the correct length would then have to stop and that second train will block the crossing. It's a real problem in railroading that is not however easily mitigated by simply saying "we need to reduce train size to a reasonable length."

The only certain mitigation is doing away with at grade crossings, something that will truly take a socialist revolution.

And please, don't tell me the railroads are responsible for drivers running the gates. People run gates. That's not because a train is 15,000 feet instead of 6000 feet. Take a ride on the head ends of passenger trains, on passenger lines where there are grade crossings. A passenger train occupies a crossing for maybe 3 seconds (most times less). The "warning" time is set by law to be no less than 20 seconds. Watch the people run around the gates.

8. Not quite that simple. Many longer and heavier trains, like the coal trains you mention or the "super-long" stack container trains, are unit trains with all cars picked up at a single originating point, and all cars going to the same destination. So a train of 200 coal cars from the Powder River Basin headed to Wisconsin Electric Power, gets relayed at crew change with no interim work. A 100 car local train may have to pick up and set off a total of 200 cars at 5 different locations during its assigned work period. Who's working the longer hours? Who experiences the most fatigue.

Simply reducing the length of a train doesn't address fatigue issues. Addressing fatigue issues-- regularizing schedules, reducing "away from home terminal" status, increasing rest periods, allowing fatigue breaks for long haul freight, testing for sleep apnea-- is not really advanced by the argument about train length and weight.

(9) Correct, 5 employee fatalities is 5 too many. Absolutely. That's the catechism we all swear to in this business.

(10). Agree, the demand to eliminate unsafe conditions is to protect employees, passengers, pedestrians, communities. We're not arguing about that H. We're arguing (1)exactly what those unsafe conditions are; how they are defined; and what the appropriate mitigations are. (2) if the proposals, or discussion points, or whatever not only address those conditions, but address the class need to organize itself as a class beyond, above outside craft, trade, restrictions.

And I think the argument started because I inferred from the RWU statements, or the presentation of RWU made by others, that increased profits on railroads over the past X years came at the expense of safety. I think that's a difficult argument to make.

That's quite different from saying that railroads aren't safe enough. That's different from saying railroads don't have a calculus of safety vs. efficiency, of cost vs. benefit. And that's different from saying that without a seizure of power, a revolutionizing of the relations of production, everybody, on and off the railroads, is fucked, and supremely. They are.

NTSB report: 188 Locomotive Engineer Not Using Cellphone

Actually, good news.

The Federal Railroad Administration put out a safety advisory:

[quote=USA Today]Less than a month after a catastrophic Amtrak derailment near Philadelphia, federal regulators called Tuesday for passenger trains to have two qualified crew members in the locomotive or in close communication when operating in areas without automatic braking.

In a 10-page safety advisory, the Federal Railroad Administration also called on passenger railroads to use automatic braking where available to comply with speed limits, identify locations where the speed limit drops at least 20 mph for a curve and install additional speed-limit signs along tracks.

[...]

Amtrak has automatic braking on most of the Northeast Corridor, and expects to complete the installation by the end of the year. The northbound curve in Philadelphia didn't have automatic braking in place, but FRA ordered it implemented after the crash.[/quote]

Did you read the Safety Advisory, H? It recommends having a second qualified person in the cab only in areas where a required deceleration of more than 20 mph is required. In lieu of having a second qualified person in the cab, FRA deems an acceptable alternative to be radio or intercom communication between the locomotive engineer in the cab and a second qualified person located in the body of the train

It's really important to read these things in their original release rather than count on USA Today. The FRA advisory is a list of recommendations, is not enforceable, and is shot through with flaws in that there is no mechanism or process for capping the maximum speed of any train approaching a restriction.

So for example, where the maximum authorized speed of the train is 60 mph and the train approaches a curve rated at 50 mph-- railroads are not required to augment their automatic train control systems if they have them, nor are they required to have a second person present; nor are they required to have the locomotive engineer communicate with another qualified person. But nothing prevents a locomotive engineer from exceeding that 60 mph "approach" speed and approaching the curve at 70 or 80 or 90 mph and thus derailing the train.

FRA's logic is exactly the faulty logic that #188 shot holes through in its derailment, because the speed approaching the curve was 80 mph while the speed at the curve was 50 mph, so even if the engineer operated at 80 mph, no derailment was predicted by simulations. But GARBAGE IN is GARBAGE OUT. The simulation, the calculation, and the simulators and the calculators never thought that the human error would occur on the tangent track where the speed would be violated to the tune of 106 mph. They assumed that the locomotive engineer would comply with the 80 mph. They assumed, and assume makes an ass out of u and me. And it kills.

One of my obligations as a prick-boss was to make sure we didn't swallow FRA's bullshit logic and set ourselves up for an "approved disaster," by complying with nonsensical recommendations.

Here's the full advisory

NTSB qualifies statement on cellphone use:

According to a friend who was present at the hearing:

yesterday the newest NTSB member, Vice-Chairman Bella Dinh-Zarr, noted on capital Hill that this is only for phone/data records, they have yet to determine if any apps were in use.

Hearing archive here

at about 1:08 into the video.