All posts by Roger Straw

Editor, owner, publisher of The Benicia Independent

Federal Regulation (U.S.), Positive Train Control

Positive Train Control: FRA says nearly all of the nation’s railroads will fail to meet Dec. 31 deadline

August 13, 2015 Roger Straw

Repost from FoxCT.com Hartford, CT
[Editor: Read the Federal Railroad Administration report in its entirety. Also, see the FRA press release. – RS]

Metro-North slammed by Blumenthal for sitting on $1 billion

By Tony Terzi, August 12, 2015 6:28 PM

metro north train crash — Metro North train crash

NEW HAVEN – Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Connecticut) is steaming because Metro-North Railroad, loaned nearly $1 billion dollars of federal money to implement a train safety technology, is sitting on that money and will miss the Federal Railroad Administration’s year-end deadline to put it in place.

With 145 train accidents resulting in 300 deaths in recent decades, Blumenthal said Wednesday he doesn’t understand why Positive Train Control technology wasn’t in place long ago.

“We’ve known about this technology and there’s been calls to implement it since 1969, when a crash in Darien took four lives,” said Blumenthal, a member of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation.

In a recent report, the FRA stated nearly all of the nation’s railroads will fail to meet the December 31 deadline.

“Tragically, our own Metro-North is failing to set a definite deadline for adopting it, which is unacceptable,” said Blumenthal.

Metro-North says the safety technology will be fully operational in 2018. All railroads not in compliance by the end of this year could be fined tens of thousands of dollars per day, until they adhere to the mandates.

A Metro-North spokesperson says “forcing fines on the MTA and other railroads, that have worked closely with the FRA to establish safe implementation timelines, distracts from our joint goal of installing PTC expeditiously.”

But, $1 billion dollars of federal money should get the wheels rolling much faster, according to passengers.

“What are they doing with the money?” asked Donielle Camerato of Branford. “Why are they waiting so long? There’s an awful lot of train accidents.”

In West Haven, in the spring of 2013, Robert Luden, of East Haven, who was a rail worker, was killed while working on the tracks.

“He would be alive today if this system had been in place because that train would’ve been stopped before it hit him,” said Blumenthal.

Shoreline East, Connecticut’s other commuter railroad, has an earlier version of Positive Train Control already in place on its tracks, which are operated by Amtrak.

To read the Federal Railroad Administration report in its entirety, click here.

Derailment, Passenger service, Public transit, Rail inspection, Track maintenance

Train derailment caused by track problem Metro knew about in July

August 13, 2015 Roger Straw

Repost from Fox5 Washington DC

Metro knew about track problem in July

By Marina Marraco, Aug 13 2015 10:18AM EDT

The derailment of a non-passenger train outside the Smithsonian Metro station last Thursday was caused by a track defect that was discovered on July 9 but not fixed, Metro said.

The transit agency is again facing public scrutiny after the derailment happened as the morning commute got underway that day. A six-car train was leaving the rail yard and gearing up for service near the Smithsonian Metro station.

Metro interim general manager and CEO Jack Requa said the train’s wheels lost contact with the rail due to an infrastructure problem known as “wide gauge.” The rail had widen so much that it caused the wheels to lose grip from the tracks and the train’s eventual derailment.

“The one that was detected was a Code Black defect,” said Metro deputy general manager Rob Troup. “That track should have been taken out of service at that period of time.”

“I want to take this opportunity to again and again apologize to our customers,” Requa said at a Wednesday afternoon news conference.

He said he could not defend the transit agency’s failure to repair the issue prior to the derailment.

“This is totally unacceptable,” said Requa. “It is unacceptable to me and it should be unacceptable to everyone within the chain of command, all the way down to track laborers and track inspectors who are out on the lines on a first-line basis.”

Following the derailment, Requa ordered a system-wide inspection of every mile of track, which could take up to a month to complete. He said customers can expect delays in the coming days as possible additional track repairs are made.

Requa apologized to customers for Thursday’s derailment and delays caused by a power issue the following day.

Bankruptcy, Offshore drilling, Oil prices, Oil producers

Oil bust claims first casualties – Hercules Offshore

August 13, 2015 Roger Straw

Repost from MySanAntonio.com

Hercules Offshore files bankruptcy with plan to convert debt

By Bloomberg, August 13, 2015

Several Texas oil and gas producers have either filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection or have missed interest payments and are heading toward restructuring. Photo: James Durbin

Hercules Offshore Inc., owner of the largest fleet of shallow-water drilling rigs in the Gulf of Mexico, filed for bankruptcy with a plan to be taken over by senior creditors.

The company said it planned to use the bankruptcy process to implement a proposal, announced in July, to cut $1.2 billion in debt. The plan calls for investors to trade their senior notes for almost 97 percent of Hercules’s equity.

Some noteholders would also lend the company $450 million to help finish building a new oil-drilling rig, the company said in a statement.

Under the plan, current shareholders would have a chance to split the 3 percent of the company not going to noteholders, Hercules said. The plan must be approved by a bankruptcy judge in Wilmington, Delaware, where the case was filed Thursday.

Hercules, which leases rigs to oil and gas producers, said the plan has the “overwhelming” support of the noteholders.

The Houston-based company, formed in 2004 as a small gulf driller, has a fleet of 27 jack-up rigs and 21 lift boats.

Flagging Demand

Demand for both U.S. and international business has flagged as the price of oil has plunged. Drillers around the world have also been suffering from a glut of new sophisticated vessels displacing older rigs in the market. Cal Dive International Inc., a contractor that does manned diving and platform installation, sought creditor protection in March.

Debt issues by Hercules and fellow Houston-based drilling rig provider Paragon Offshore were among the worst-performing oil and gas service bonds in the high-yield energy index in the first quarter of 2015, according to Bloomberg Intelligence analysts Spencer Cutter and Yuanliang Huang.

The number of rigs operating in the U.S. Gulf of Mexico has fallen by more than half from last year’s high of 63 in August, according to Baker Hughes Inc.

Hercules listed liabilities of $1.3 billion and $546 million in assets as of Aug. 11.

The case is In re Hercules Offshore Inc., 15-11685, U.S. Bankruptcy Court, District of Delaware (Wilmington).

Oil Industry, Rail inspection, Rail Safety, Railroad workers, State regulation, Track maintenance

N.D. hires BNSF manager as inspector for state rail safety program

August 10, 2015 Roger Straw

Repost from the Billings Gazette

N.D. hires BNSF manager as inspector for state rail safety program

By Mike Nowatzki, Forum News Service, August 10, 2015

BISMARCK, N.D. – A manager for the railroad involved in two fiery oil train derailments in North Dakota during the past two years has been hired as the first track inspector for a new state-run rail safety program.

Karl Carson will go to work for the state Public Service Commission on Aug. 17, doing inspections to identify problems with track and worker safety.

A Minot native, Carson is a division engineer with BNSF Railway. He’s worked for the railroad since 1992, holding several positions including assistant director of maintenance production, in which he supervised maintenance and replacement of track and track components, according to the PSC. He’s worked in management for BNSF since 2004.

Commission chairwoman Julie Fedorchak said the PSC wanted an inspector with experience, and with only two major railroads operating in the state – BNSF and Canadian Pacific – hiring someone with connections to one of them was “just an unavoidable situation.”

She said she asked Carson during his interview “if he would have a hard time regulating his old friends, and he said, ‘Absolutely not.’”

“His experience helps him to understand where the strengths and the weaknesses are and will really help him engage directly with the railroad,” she said. “They know his experience and they know he knows what he’s talking about.”

North Dakota is the 31st state to partner with the Federal Railroad Administration on a state rail safety program. The FRA has primary responsibility for rail safety in every state.

The PSC began looking seriously at the need for a state program after the December 2013 derailment of a BNSF oil tanker train near Casselton, which caused a massive fireball and voluntary evacuation of the city. Six cars from a BNSF oil train derailed May 6 near Heimdal in east-central North Dakota. No one was hurt in either incident.

Carson’s new position is one of two approved by state lawmakers in April when they voted to spend $523,345 on the state rail safety program in 2015-17, with the intent of continuing the pilot program in 2017-19.

“We’re quite pleased with the caliber of the first inspector,” Fedorchak said. “He’s got more rail experience than I had hoped for, and I think in talking with other states, that was the key ingredient they emphasized.”

State Sen. Tyler Axness, D-Fargo, who first publicly suggested a state-run rail safety program in July 2014 during his unsuccessful campaign for the PSC, said he doesn’t necessarily disagree with Fedorchak that the pool of qualified applicants for the inspector job is probably limited in North Dakota, and he declined to make any judgments about the hire without seeing the pool of applicants.

But Axness and Wayde Schafer, conservation organizer for the Dacotah Chapter of the Sierra Club, both said it seems like the state has a pattern of hiring regulators with close ties to the industries they will oversee. Schafer said on such a contentious issue as rail safety, “it seems like they would want to hire somebody who was a little bit more neutral.”

“You’d think something this controversial, even the appearance of impropriety should be avoided whenever possible,” he said.

Don Morrison, executive director of the Dakota Resource Council, drew a comparison to the hiring of Lynn Helms, a former employee of Texaco and what is now Hess Corp. who now regulates and promotes the state’s oil and gas industry as director of the state Department of Mineral Resources.

“It certainly looks like business as usual, which is give the industry what they want,” he said. “Time will tell.”

Fedorchak said the PSC had 18 applicants for the job and interviewed the top five, with second interviews for the two finalists. She noted Carson was the “strong favorite” among the FRA inspectors on the interview panel.

Carson earned a certificate of completion in auto mechanics from Bismarck State College in 1990 and also served in the North Dakota Army National Guard from 1990 to 1994. He couldn’t immediately be reached for comment.

His annual salary with the PSC will be $90,000.