Passenger Trains > A Newspaper Article Worthy Of Review

With the recent news reports of two men arrested in Canada for plotting to sabotage a passenger train, there was an interesting article in the MAR 12, 2004 edition of USA TODAY that is probably worth reviewing. This was shortly after the Madrid train bombings.

In the article, a San Diego-based Amtrak conductor, Larry Lindbloom (now retired), deviated from an internal Company directive where front-line, schedule employees are not permitted to discuss sensitive matters with the news media. This was a brave move on his part. As you read into the article, you'll see where he didn't really get all that much support from his union local chairman.

Since I can't reproduce the entire article here due to copyright concerns, here's an excerpt and the link:

Amtrak increases security; passengers worry after bombing

NEW HAVEN, Conn. (AP) — Security officials stepped up safety measures at rail systems nationwide after the bombings in Madrid, but Amtrak conductor Larry Lindbloom acknowledges he's worried as he runs his daily route between San Diego and Los Angeles.

The route is one of the busiest on the West Coast and passes by a major military base and a nuclear power plant. Although Amtrak officials say they are confident in their security measures, the 15-year veteran conductor is not.

"We're totally vulnerable. I don't know why it hasn't happened yet," he said. "I hope it doesn't . . . One of these days there's going to be a big orange flash and I'm going to walk back there, and there'll be 20 dead. It's terrible and all of these people are in danger."

http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/nation/2004-03-12-amtrak-security_x.htm#

It's always important to consider the need for proper security, but it's also important to keep people moving. It isn't possible to assure 100 percent security AND operate passenger trains in an efficient and reasonable manner. It's a balancing act to be sure, but I'd rather not stifle too many freedoms in an attempt to prevent any act that could be imagined. I don't pretend to have the best answer to this question, but I do see a tendency to impose restrictive security provisions that go too far.

and i think America's passenger/commuter need a lot more security on the trains and in the stations.....

66

stuporchief Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> It's always important to consider the need for
> proper security, but it's also important to keep
> people moving. It isn't possible to assure 100
> percent security AND operate passenger trains in
> an efficient and reasonable manner. It's a
> balancing act to be sure, but I'd rather not
> stifle too many freedoms in an attempt to prevent
> any act that could be imagined. I don't pretend to
> have the best answer to this question, but I do
> see a tendency to impose restrictive security
> provisions that go too far.

Lining up people in front of a gate, waiting for an arbitrary signal to board --five minutes and not a second earlier-- would seem like a great target.

So is a crowded downtown street, a busy department store, a line at a sporting event and hundreds of other places were Americans go and congregate as part of our free society. Where do we stop once we start restricting these things?

I've always been amazed at the intense show of security at the major originating stations (armed uniformed officers, K-9 sniffer dogs, occasional bag searches at temporary checkpoints, etc.).

And that's all it is. A "show." As in, "Dog and Pony Show."

You can go to any down-line, non-agency station and encounter absolutely NO degree of security. None. Nada. Zilch.

Other than for "show," what's the point of all this?

Definitely more security is needed on the trains. Not just due to potential terrorist attacks, but due to some of the low lifes that ride Amtrak....

Well how about a common sense approach to security? In fact common sense would go along way in most situations. Not in the USA or with Fed Gov.

But we live in a PC world where if it scurries like a rat, has rat ears, has a rat's tail, and makes rat s--t don't call it a rat because someone somewhere will get pissed. We prefer the knee jerk reaction and the makes m feel better solution. Lets strip search the 80 year old grandmother but holy crap don't look at the middle eastern group, might stir up trouble!

It looks as though there were many signs before 911 and now the Boston bombings yet this situation is the first that I am aware of that was stopped before it went down. Does anyone have other situations that have stopped this kind of terrorism?

I am sure the fall out from this will not be good for most of us and only mildly distressing to actual terrorist.

Another of my stinking opinions.

KR

kdrtrains Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Well how about a common sense approach to
> security? In fact common sense would go along way
> in most situations. Not in the USA or with Fed
> Gov.
>
> But we live in a PC world where if it scurries
> like a rat, has rat ears, has a rat's tail, and
> makes rat s--t don't call it a rat because someone
> somewhere will get pissed. We prefer the knee jerk
> reaction and the makes m feel better solution.
> Lets strip search the 80 year old grandmother but
> holy crap don't look at the middle eastern group,
> might stir up trouble!
>
> It looks as though there were many signs before
> 911 and now the Boston bombings yet this situation
> is the first that I am aware of that was stopped
> before it went down. Does anyone have other
> situations that have stopped this kind of
> terrorism?
>
> I am sure the fall out from this will not be good
> for most of us and only mildly distressing to
> actual terrorist.
>
> Another of my stinking opinions.
>
> KR

One of the lingering issues involves the time line for Tamerlan, the older brother.

The Russians asked the US to check up on him, due to their concerns about his contacts with people the Russians consider terrorists. The FBI interviewed him in 2011, and decided there was no information of value. However the US holds up his application for citizenship.

A few months later, the guy goes to Russia on his Russian passport. The US is unaware because the airline misspells his name by one character. It appears he's on a TSA watch list. A few months after that, he returns to the US. Still not noticed. His own mosque throws him out for practicing hate speech and preaching jihad. His wife leaves him for his berating her about not being sufficiently Islamic. Still not noticed.

Lots of clues floating around on that character.

This train seems to be leaving the track!

http://goo.gl/bhgFL

Foxy news article today.

I have been using commuter trains, Amtrak, and European railroads for more than 40 years. In every situation there was a fairly narrow path to the train I was to board. It seems to me that a few drug or explosive sniffing dogs would have been capable of detecting unwanted substances. Don't know why they are paraded around the stations instead of being focussed on major departing tains.

What is Walmart doing? How about MacDonalds? Think of symbolic target value, open access, large crowds, and the huge number of locations needing security. Now that is a security problem that must cause management a lot of sleepless nights. Having said all this I suspect a bomb or two might actually result in an initial surge of business as the masses rallied to show support. So far, corporate targets seem to be pretty rare, but that could quickly change. Why would any terrorist waste effort on a heavily guarded airport, big rail or subway station, etc. when so many seemingly soft targets are available? Video surveillance may be the most important consideration as to which targets are selected.
.

It seems like some of Amtrak's conductors should get "hazard pay" (or similar). Just off the top of my head, these guys (and gals) work literally in the middle of the night with a train full of young, rowdy, drunk, partiers. I'm thinking of the Coast Starlight during the summer months. At 0300, you're miles from civilization (and police), so they have to handle things on their own without ANY training as far as personal protection, defensive tactics, or anything of the sort. They're in a railroad job, but sometimes have the role of cop.

Fortunately (for the time being) the Jihadists have shown that they have a flat learning curve. They've focused on carnage, and terror rather than on inflicting physical damage to our fragile infrastructure.

During the Boston Massacre the Tsarnaev brothers killed four, maimed and injured a couple of hundred other innocent people, and then killed a few more during the Watertown shootout a few days later. For their purposes it was a smashing success -- lots of blood and guts, a few dead infidels and a hundreds more permanently scarred. Allahu Akbar, baby!!

I feel confident they were completely unaware of (and didn't even consider) the tremendous damage they did to the Boston area infrastructure -- at all levels. The city went on lockdown. Businesses were shut down for several days. Travel inside the area was restricted. Travel by train and air to and from Boston was suspended -- with a national ripple effect.

The point is that I'm afraid that sooner or later they're going to learn that if they turn their focus our infrastructure's abundant Achilles Heels they can do far more physical damage and create chaos on a broader scale. To what end they do these things, I don't know, but if pain is the game, they could inflict a lot more

I'll cite one example of an infrastructure vulnerability and let you draw your own conclusions. At Memphis there is one-count it - one operating railroad bridge over the Mississippi River. It's a very busy bridge. These people seem not to care about their own lives so dying while taking it down (or rendering it impassable) wouldn't be a consideration for them. Imagine the chaos that would be created if they were to succeed.

Fritz in HSV, AL

navy5717th Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I'll cite one example of an infrastructure
> vulnerability and let you draw your own
> conclusions. At Memphis there is one-count it -
> one operating railroad bridge over the Mississippi
> River. It's a very busy bridge. These people seem
> not to care about their own lives so dying while
> taking it down (or rendering it impassable)
> wouldn't be a consideration for them. Imagine the
> chaos that would be created if they were to
> succeed.

http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/21300.Train_Man

Ray

navy5717th Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I'll cite one example of an infrastructure
> vulnerability and let you draw your own
> conclusions. At Memphis there is one-count it -
> one operating railroad bridge over the Mississippi
> River. It's a very busy bridge. These people seem
> not to care about their own lives so dying while
> taking it down (or rendering it impassable)
> wouldn't be a consideration for them. Imagine the
> chaos that would be created if they were to
> succeed.

The bridge is only used by freight trains. Taking it out would truly mess up the operational traffic flows for BNSF, UP, CSX, NS and IC, but that's not what they're looking for. They like things that bring on more blood and carnage, like what we saw on 9-11 and in Boston.

CA_Sou_MA_Agent Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> navy5717th Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > I'll cite one example of an infrastructure
> > vulnerability and let you draw your own
> > conclusions. At Memphis there is one-count it -
> > one operating railroad bridge over the
> Mississippi
> > River. It's a very busy bridge. These people
> seem
> > not to care about their own lives so dying
> while
> > taking it down (or rendering it impassable)
> > wouldn't be a consideration for them. Imagine
> the
> > chaos that would be created if they were to
> > succeed.
>
> The bridge is only used by freight trains. Taking
> it out would truly mess up the operational traffic
> flows for BNSF, UP, CSX, NS and IC, but that's not
> what they're looking for. They like things that
> bring on more blood and carnage, like what we saw
> on 9-11 and in Boston.

preferably in view of lots of TV cameras.

Notice how the much more deadly fertilizer plant explosion in the middle of nowhere, media-wise, was crowded off the front pages by a much less deadly but much better photographed explosion in Boston

Thanks -- bought it this afternoon from Barnes & Nobel for my Nook.

Will make for good reading on our upcoming trip to New Zealand ;-)

Fritz in HSV, AL

Lackawanna484 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> CA_Sou_MA_Agent Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > navy5717th Wrote:
> >
> --------------------------------------------------
>
> > -----
> > > I'll cite one example of an infrastructure
> > > vulnerability and let you draw your own
> > > conclusions. At Memphis there is one-count it
> -
> > > one operating railroad bridge over the
> > Mississippi
> > > River. It's a very busy bridge. These people
> > seem
> > > not to care about their own lives so dying
> > while
> > > taking it down (or rendering it impassable)
> > > wouldn't be a consideration for them. Imagine
> > the
> > > chaos that would be created if they were to
> > > succeed.
> >
> > The bridge is only used by freight trains.
> Taking
> > it out would truly mess up the operational
> traffic
> > flows for BNSF, UP, CSX, NS and IC, but that's
> not
> > what they're looking for. They like things
> that
> > bring on more blood and carnage, like what we
> saw
> > on 9-11 and in Boston.
>
> preferably in view of lots of TV cameras.
>
> Notice how the much more deadly fertilizer plant
> explosion in the middle of nowhere, media-wise,
> was crowded off the front pages by a much less
> deadly but much better photographed explosion in
> Boston


1. I prefaced my posting with:

"Fortunately (for the time being) the Jihadists have shown that they have a flat learning curve. They've focused on carnage, and terror rather than on inflicting physical damage to our fragile infrastructure."

I'm well aware of the Jihadists' proclivity for inflicting carnage. My point was that we're fortunate that they haven't caught on (yet) that they could do far more harm by messing with the numerous vulnerabilities of our fragile infrastructure -- with the same minimal kind of effort they used in Boston.

2. I agree that the media preferred covering the Boston Massacre more than the West explosion. Boston is on a coast. It's important. West is in fly-over country -- who cares?

Fritz in HSV, AL