Final Report On Monorail Collision

The NTSB has issued its final report on the tragic monorail collision from two years ago that killed a Disney monorail operator.

The agency faulted Disney itself in three areas.

First, investigators noted that the resort did not require its employees to follow an operating guide in which monorail drivers were supposed to switch from the front cab of their trains to the back cab before driving in reverse, so they could operate the trains while in a forward-facing position. The driver of the train that hit Wuennenberg's trains told NTSB investigators that it was "not an uncommon practice" for trains to back through track switches while drivers were still operating their trains from the front cab.

In addition, NTSB noted that Disney's policies did not require that the central coordinator be stationed in the control tower when directing monorail movements. The tower is equipped with both a grid showing how the monorail beams are aligned and an emergency shutdown switch that can stop all trains on the tracks.

Lastly, the resort's procedures did not require that the employee in the monorail shop responsible for operating the track switches verify that the beam had been realigned after entering the switch command into a control panel.

One can only hope that something that is this preventable would not occur again.

Zz.