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Unreal.
Unfortunately, watching the coverage this morning there is just so much misinformation about the recent history of this section of track and this “inaugural” train voyage. The Seattle to Portland passenger train run has been regularly scheduled for many years.
This “detour” through an urban area at high speed was hugely expensive, highly controversial, and only suppose to shave 4 minutes off the normal route. When one considers that this multibillion dollar “improvement” was only suppose to save a very limited number of passengers a minimal amount of time... heads should roll, but since this is an all government boondoggle I would expect that no one will ever be held accountable.
Sound Transit “purchased” the section of track where the train derailed and has recently spent 800 million dollars just “improving” the tracks. A BNSF railroad representative was on our local news and said they had no responsibility for this section of track.
The maximum speed on the straight sections of track in this area is 79mph, but this was on a curve. On the coverage we have seen it looks like the locomotive derailed at the curve and kept going straight while the cars behind it accordioned and ended up all over the place with some falling off of the bridge and onto the freeway.