- Image by Evan Wohrman via Flickr
Earlier this week, we reported on a monorail accident at Disneyworld in Florida. It appears that early reports on the accident were incorrect.
We reported, as per these stories, that the monorail operated by Austin Wuennenberg slammed into another monorail. Apparently, that was not true. The latest information indicates that the incident occurred when the second train was set to be transferred off the track to a spur to go to the maintenance bay. Instead of being switched, it traveled backward on the Epcot line when Wuennenberg’s train hit it. Wuennenberg actually tried to reverse as he saw the other train approaching.
Three people are involved in a track switch. The operator of the train, someone in the monorail’s central office, and a worker in the maintenance bay who activates the switches. To perform a switch, the train will be instructed to go beyond the switch and stop. Then, monorail central will radio for the switch to be activated, then order the operator to reverse across the switch onto the new line.
However, an anonymous source indicates that the worker at monorail central was not at the central control console at the time of the accident. The coordinator had gone home sick, and the operation was handled by a manager, who was off-site at the time. However, even without them, the maintenance worker should have seen that the switch was not activated, and the operator of the train in question should have known his train was not going where it was supposed to. Finally, at least one individual on the platform should have had the ability to shut down power in an emergency.
The investigation is the NTSB‘s first one of an accident on private property, and Disney has cooperated fully with it. We are certain the investigation will discover the cause of this tragedy.
