Probe: Fla. Responders Faced Difficulties Locating Derailed Train

April 01--A Tri-Rail train with 56 morning commuters derailed in the rainy dark of early morning, fuel was leaking from a gash in the tank, and the train was reported to be on fire. But no one could find it.

There was mass confusion as firefighters and paramedics searched nearly a half hour for the train in the dawn of Jan. 28, audio recordings and written dispatcher updates obtained by the Sun Sentinel show.

A Tri-Rail representative, the first to call 911, gave an inaccurate location and claimed the train had no passengers.

"The train is derailed and is on fire," he reported.

Records from the Broward Sheriff's Office, which operates the county's relatively new regional emergency dispatch system, claim the response time to the call was five minutes. Responders did arrive somewhere in five minutes -- but dispatchers had sent them to the wrong location.

In truth, it took 27 minutes for the first fire truck to find its way to the crash scene off Southwest Eighth Street in Pompano Beach, dispatch logs and audio recordings show. That truck arrived at 5:46 a.m.; the initial call for help had come in at 5:19 a.m.

Fort Lauderdale Fire Chief Robert Hoecherl said he was left wondering whether enough has been done to prevent a more tragic outcome. The stakes are high, he said.

"It's a commuter train," he said. "It's a train full of people."

Fort Lauderdale is among the several cities that have been critically scrutinizing the quality and response times of the county's emergency dispatching. The city has threatened to withdraw from the regional system.

In this case, by the time firefighters made it to the scene, 2,000 gallons of diesel fuel had spilled to the ground, according to taped conversations among emergency responders and dispatchers.

Tri-Rail representatives gave only one update to the emergency dispatchers, according to the records, advising that the train was north of where they'd originally reported it, but not providing a cross street.

Almost an hour after the first 911 call, emergency officials still didn't know if the train had struck something on the tracks, possibly a car, and sent a helicopter up to search. Commuters all over the area were stuck at the tracks west of Interstate 95, as the gates remained in the down position.

Heavy winds and an advancing thunderstorm contributed to the search difficulties, the recordings show.

On his way to the gym that morning, Fort Lauderdale Deputy Fire Chief Tim Heiser heard the "frustrating" radio traffic as firefighters looked for the train all over the north end of the city. He turned around to go home and change into work clothes.

"I thought this was the big one," he said.

Where is the train?

Fort Lauderdale firefighter-paramedics in two fire engines, an ambulance, a ladder truck, a heavy rescue truck, and a battalion vehicle spread out looking. The police helped, too.

"Can you pinpoint it please? Are they at the Cypress Creek station?" one emergency responder asked the dispatcher.

"We were at the Tri-Rail station," another firefighter interjected. "There is no train there at Cypress Creek."

"OK, you say you're online with the Tri-Rail people themselves," a firefighter said as they strained to figure out directions the dispatcher had given. "Can you try to verify exactly where they're saying?"

"There's nothing at Commercial," a firefighter said a bit later.

Broward Sheriff's Office regional dispatchers never did figure out where the derailed train was.

Fort Lauderdale emergency personnel eventually did, seeing its taillights in the distance north of McNab Road.

It was in Pompano Beach.

Even after finding out where the train was, dispatchers spent another six minutes trying to enter the location into the computer system in order to send out the correct agency, Pompano Beach. The software favors exact addresses, sheriff's office officials explained.

"Can you advise on the exact location?" the 911 dispatcher asked.

"Negative," says an emergency responder. "You'd have to look at a map."

A 911 recording shows that at least two calls from BSO dispatchers to Tri-Rail went unanswered that Thursday morning. Eventually, someone from Tri-Rail called back.

"We keep getting calls from BSO. That's why we're calling back," a Tri-Rail representative said, explaining that employees were tied up talking to federal rail officials about the derailment.

Tri-Rail officials say information got jumbled as it passed from a shaken train conductor to a Tri-Rail dispatcher to a Tri-Rail safety coordinator to 911 dispatchers.

The location closer to the train, Cypress Interlocking, a safety control point, became "Cypress Creek station," which is to the south and in a different city, said Allen Yoder, director of safety and security for the South Florida Regional Transportation Authority, operator of Tri-Rail.

But Yoder couldn't explain why the presence of 56 people wasn't reported to emergency dispatchers. One of the passengers was hurt and taken to the hospital when paramedics arrived.

"There is no one on board," the dispatcher log says.

Yoder also said he didn't "see any scorch marks" and believes Tri-Rail's initial report that the train was on fire was inaccurate.

Firefighters at the scene mentioned "fire suppression" and said they "knocked down the fire," records show, but Yoder said he didn't see evidence of a fire.

The train was a "double draft set," or two trains hooked together, the rear one empty, Tri-Rail spokeswoman Bonnie Arnold said. The front and rear of the train remained on the tracks, while a locomotive and empty cars in the middle derailed, she and Yoder said.

The incident and Tri-Rail's handling of it are still under investigation at Tri-Rail, he said. Investigators have ruled out that the train hit something but haven't identified the cause. The Federal Rail Administration also is investigating.

A repeat is unlikely, though, according to Tri-Rail.

Yoder said Tri-Rail launched new software several weeks ago allowing it to see where its trains are on a real-time map. The technology was already in the works when the train derailed, Yoder said, and was put into use about a month later. Eventually, riders will be able to see where trains are via a Tri-Rail app.

"Our new technology will prevent this from happening again," Arnold said. "We're just grateful to have it. It's been a long time coming."

Off the rails

Broward Sheriff's Office officials reviewed their handling of the 911 call after Pompano Beach complained about the delay.

The review concluded nothing went wrong and didn't recommend any changes. No one involved was counseled or retrained.

Executive Director Bob Pusins of BSO's Department of Community Services said the agency's 911 dispatchers did their best "with the information and tools available."

Finding and accessing a train when it's not at a major intersection can be like finding a lost boater or a plane crash in the Everglades, he said.

"Nothing happens perfectly all the time, and this is one of those cases," Pusins said. "It's not a perfect science."

But in internal emails, BSO and Broward County employees argued over whether the complaint raised legitimate concerns.

The sheriff's office operates the system under a contract with Broward County, and the two have been at odds in the past year and a half over the system's troubles. Getting accurate information to emergency responders has been a key problem.

"6 minutes to generate a call after you have been given the precise location is unacceptable," Jenna Diplacido in the county's Office of Regional communications and Technology wrote to sheriff's office employees, referring to the delay in dispatching Pompano Beach responders.

Brett Bayag, acting director of the Office of Regional Communications and Technology, said the incident will be reviewed for any learning opportunities. Though BSO didn't recommend it, Bayag said dispatchers might need "refresher training" on entering vague addresses, which he said can be done.

"We'll learn from situations like this and make sure that awareness factor is heightened," Bayag said.

Pompano Beach operations division Chief Chester "Butch" Bolton said he no longer had an issue with the delay when he learned all the facts about the call.

The original information from Tri-Rail was wrong, so the search in Fort Lauderdale and the delay in calling out his emergency trucks "was justified," he said in an email.

Hoecherl, the fire chief, said he thought about the commuter train derailment in Philadelphia last year that killed eight people and injured more than 200.

Even when you know where they are, train accidents are often difficult for emergency vehicles to access, he said. Sometimes firefighters have to park far from the crash and carry equipment. A response delay of a half hour in a crisis could have been disastrous, he said.

"You're talking about a train that probably has 300 people traveling through our city several times a day," he said. " ... It raises a concern on the accuracy of the information."

bwallman@tribune.com or 954-356-4541. On Twitter @BrittanyWallman and @BrowardPolitics.

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