Four Suspended Over CTA Derailment

By Marcus Gilmer in News on Dec 15, 2009 3:40PM

Four workers have been suspended without pay for last weekend's Green Line derailment, including the lead car operator. According to ABC 7: "The CTA says the operator of the lead car in Saturday's derailment blew past a red stop signal. Her union says she simply wasn't familiar with the route. She was filling in for someone who was sick and had never worked it before." The Trib reports that the rear operator then "powered up the train and pulled it back in the other direction, apparently in a bid to fix the problem" but was unsuccessful. The rear operator was also suspended, as were a tower man and a supervisor but CTA officials wouldn't elaborate on those suspensions.

Saturday's derailment happened as the train was making the turn to go north from the 63rd/Ashland branch to the main line, close to where a similar derailment happened in May 2008; that derailment was also blamed on "operator error."