A federal audit of MARTA raised safety concerns that included the death of a transit patron, faulty indicator lights that tell controllers whether the “third rail” is hot, and a “near miss” between a train and a work vehicle in a rail yard.
In response, MARTA officials cited limited resources that contributed to the transit death and contended that, despite the concerns raised by auditors, employees were never in danger because of safety redundancies built into the system.
The 2010 Federal Transit Administration audit had been targeted for last year but was moved up in priority because MARTA had failed to rectify a number of safety concerns raised in a 2008 audit.
Channel 2 Action News and The Atlanta Journal-Constitution secured the previously unreleased 2010 audit through the Freedom of Information Action earlier this month.
Among the problems noted in the 2010 audit was that MARTA didn’t fully report the 2008 death of a man to the Georgia Department of Transportation, which is its oversight agency.
The death involved an unidentified man who fell on an escalator in the Georgia State University station and was strangled to death when some clothing around his neck was pulled into the escalator comb plates. According to the audit, the man took an hour to die but no MARTA police officers responded, despite the entire episode being captured by security cameras.
On Wednesday, Georgette Gregory, MARTA assistant general manager of safety and quality assurance, provided the AJC and Channel 2 an explanation for that: “We don’t have specific people who monitor the cameras,” she said. “We don’t have the resources to continually watch the cameras.”
The report faulted MARTA’s investigation into the death for failing to include details on whether track workers who were nearby as the man was dying were interviewed “to determine if they saw the victim prior to his final demise.”
It also noted that a MARTA police officer failed to discover the patron because he did not properly check the platform before the station’s closing, and it said MARTA did not report this security violation to the state Transportation Department.
“MARTA did not include information related to this concern in its final investigation report submitted to GDOT,” the audit said. “MARTA stated they did not want to include investigation information regarding security sensitive matters with their police department.”
MARTA assistant police Chief Joseph Dorsey said the 1,100 cameras in the stations are used primarily as an investigative tool. Dorsey noted that the MARTA police officer who violated policy by not properly checking the platform was suspended without pay.
It was the second such death at a MARTA rail station in a three-year period. In 2005, Sanford Ricks was strangled after he fell on an escalator and his clothing became caught in the mechanism. In that case, a MARTA employee pushed the emergency stop for the escalator but Ricks died after being taken to the hospital.
Questions were raised about MARTA’s handling of that case after the transit agency’s chief counsel, Elizabeth O’Neill, said a camera recording of the accident was destroyed as part of regular maintenance.
The 2010 audit also raised questions about the safety of MARTA track workers, who had reported to auditors that indicator lights that tell the rail control center whether the electrified third rail is hot often malfunctioned. The lights sometimes signaled that the power was off when it was on, which track workers feared put them at risk.
Rich Krisak, MARTA assistant general manager of rail, said the workers were never in any danger because of the malfunctioning lights, which he said continue to malfunction because of aging infrastructure.
He said on-site workers ensure the power is shut off before touching the rail regardless of what the indicators in the control center read.
“A worker would never work on the third rail based on the indicators in the rail control center,” he said. “That would be a violation of all safety procedures.”
Gregory said track workers have been retrained on the role of the indication lights and how their safety was based on power cutoffs initiated in the work area. “I took the training guys with me to make sure they knew they were safe,” she said.
MARTA has had an ongoing $117 million capital improvement project since last year to upgrade infrastructure but the warning lights are considered “nonvital” because they don’t deal directly with worker safety, Krisak said.
Krisak also said that the near miss in the South Rail Yard between a train and work-utility vehicle on the same track at the same time did not involve any risk to workers.
The train was going only 15 mph and the danger was spotted when the two vehicles were still 200 feet apart, he said. Trains in the rail yards are not monitored electronically but are monitored visually by controllers.
Audit findings
• MARTA didn’t fully report a death in which a man was strangled by clothing caught in an escalator. MARTA says an officer who didn’t discover the incident was suspended without pay.
• Workers said indicator lights sometimes failed to tell if the electrified third-rail was turned on. MARTA says other steps ensure power is off during repairs.
• A near-miss was reported in a rail yard. MARTA says the danger was spotted when the vehicles were 200 feet apart.
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