CSX hit with penalty for malfunctioning safety equipment

CSX hit with penalty for malfunctioning safety equipment    CSX Transportation, one of two major East Coast freight railroads, was fined $298,000 by the Federal Railroad Administration for multiple violations of highway-rail grade crossing safety regulations related to a Feb. 3, 2004 accident in Henrietta, N.Y., where a train struck a vehicle and killed an elderly couple.
   CSX was faulted for being slow to make repairs at three crossings where the flashing lights and gates were known to be malfunctioning. In addition, the FRA cited the railroad for failing to have the train crew involved in the accident stop and flag highway traffic as the alternate means of providing warning and protection to motorists. A citation also was issued for inadequate drainage caused by fouled ballast at one of the crossings.
   CSX will have an opportunity to respond to the penalties and present mitigating factors that may lead to a settlement agreement, FRA said.
   Following the Henrietta accident, FRA inspected 199 other highway-rail grade crossings maintained by CSX in New York. The FRA identified problems at several crossings that led CSX to develop and implement an action plan to bring them into compliance. The FRA said may assess civil penalties for those violations as well.
   The enforcement action was atypical because the FRA usually doesn’t investigate grade-crossing accidents unless three or more deaths, or other unusual circumstances, are involved. The FRA conducted full investigations on four of about 3,000 grade crossing accidents in 2003, according to the New York Times, which published a series of articles last summer about railroad safety and lax oversight. The inspector general for the Department of Transportation, the FRA’s parent agency, subsequently launched an investigation into how safety regulations were being enforced.