So, he's suing Amtrak saying he was improperly trained but readily admits he took control of something he wasn't trained on?
I'm curious to the logic as well. But, let the legal system figure this out.
As far as the "being properly trained" on the Physical Characteristics of the RR I'll give you my two cents on things.
During my time at NS the "Choo Choo U" section of things for them is 15 days. So three weeks. I then had 3 months of OJT before marking up and getting my Conductor Card. 3 months of OJT is not enough time to learn Physical Characteristics of hundreds of miles of Railroad, learn the crucial rules like NORAC Rule 80. (Movement at Restricted Speed) I was given 2 weeks to learn the railroad between PHIL and BELL on the Corridor as well as PARK and GLEN on the Harrisburg Line. Amtrak required 3 R/T's on the head end to even take the PC test. I'm not kidding, I took 10 R/T's for each section of RR. So two a day. I truly believe that I could have been perfectly fine with 3 R/T's on the PH line. But there is a HUGE difference between day running and night running. So I did 1 R/T during daylight hours, and one after dark. Best choice I made. Plain and simple. So bottom line as far as OJT went at NS. I had 10 weeks of it. When I went to the division office to Mark Up, they asked if we saw everything that we should have saw, or if we needed more time to see things. Between myself and one of my Brother Conductors, we told them that 10 weeks of OJT is a joke, that we felt rushed, and that the practice of rushing CT's through OJT will lead to more and more incidents. I told them that I hadn't been to a yard that we served 7 days a week and I'd like two weeks to go over that yard. They laughed and said, "Get a pilot if you go there." 2 weeks later I got called for a train to that yard, and I asked for a pilot Conductor. I explained to the crew caller who was the best, that I hadn't been there and so and so from the division office told me to request a pilot. After I hung up with them 10 minutes later the Terminal Super called me and asked why I marked up without going to the yard. I told him what happened. So once he got my side of the story, he was understanding. But the guys and gals that work as middle upper management laughing at a request for two weeks to go to a yard that we served 7 days a week is horrifying to me. I've interviewed to go back to NS twice, and they reduced the period of OJT from 3 months to 2 months. My main concern is that they are putting out guys and gals on the RR to learn hundreds of miles of RR in such a short amount of time. These days it's all about layoffs. Precision Scheduled Railroading (PSR) is all about shareholder value, getting things to their destination on-time, not safety. Derailments have gone up dramatically over the past 5 years, since CSX became the first US Freight Carrier to adopt PSR, followed by UP, and NS. PSR is an extremely dangerous trend. And I truly believe that the only way to end it, is that Congress steps in.
Now as far as Amtrak's training methods on the T&E side. I can't speak to any of it since I'm not an Amtrak employee. I've heard that it's very detailed. I know that for new hire engineers there is about 2 years of OJT before being marked up and running you're on your own. And honestly, that's the way it should be. With Amtrak you're hauling people at a wide range of speeds that top out on the NEC at 150 mph. I recently was speaking with the conductor and engineer of a train that I ride frequently. The day before I was talking with them, it came up that the engineer had a student running for a certain period of time. And the student was running in the 150 mph zone in RI near TF Green. He opened it up and kept an eye of the speedometer and panicked at 147 and throttled off before he should have. That is part of the training. The speed is no joke and it'll mess with you.
Bottom line, Passenger and Freight are completely different beasts. But, IMO Amtrak is doing the right things as far as training for Student Engineers. Freight has work to do right now. Right now as it stands freight is laying thousands of employees off for the shareholders, and the heck with safety. Even when they did hire people it was a rushed process. If someone makes one wrong move, it can injure that person at a minimum, and kill them and potentially others in a worst case scenario.
