U.S. Amtrak train speeding before fatal derailment, preliminary probe shows

SAN FRANCISCO, Dec. 19 (Xinhua) -- A preliminary probe showed that an Amtrak train was travelling about 50 miles (80 km) per hour faster than the speed limit near a curve where it derailed Monday in the U.S. state of Washington, local media reported Tuesday.

Recordings from the train's data recorder at the rear locomotive indicated that the train was running at about 80 miles (129 km) per hour, on a curve with a limit of 30 miles (48 km) per hour, when it jumped the tracks, which killed three people and injured scores of others.

Federal transportation officials are planning to interview the engineer and crew members of the train on Tuesday to help determine why it was speeding.

An official of the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) said it was too early to say why the train was going at that speed.

Local media said that the Amtrak train was supposed to slow dramatically before entering the curve where the derailment occurred.

The speed limit at the curve where the train crossed I-5 is 30 miles (48 km) per hour, while the speed limit on most of the track is 79 mph (about 127 km) per hour, an NTSB spokeswoman said Monday.

The train, Amtrak 501, run by intercity rail operator Amtrak, went off tracks on Monday on its first run on a new route in Pierce County in Washington state on the U.S. west coast.

The train carrying 80 passengers and six crew members was heading south from Seattle when 13 of its 14 cars jumped tracks near DuPont, a city in Pierce, with some cars falling off a bridge and hitting vehicles below.

The route was opened after weeks of inspection and testing, and fallen train cars damaged five vehicles and two semi-trucks traveling on the highway below.

The southbound lanes of Interstate 5 (I-5) freeway were completely blocked by the train.

Officials warned of lengthy traffic delays as the southbound freeway, near Mounts Road outside of DuPont, remains closed for cleanup work to remove the overturned train cars from the freeway.

The NTSB has sent a 20-member team to the state to investigate the incident.

Amtrak said in an earlier press release that the railway route has recently undergone a retrofit program costing 181 million U.S. dollars in order to reroute passenger trains away from the curving shore of Puget Sound to an existing inland rail line between Tacoma and Olympia that has less freight traffic.

Founded in 1971 and headquartered in the Union Station in Washington, D.C., Amtrak serves more than 500 destinations in 46 U.S. states and three Canadian provinces with more than 300 trains running over 34,000 kilometers daily. Enditem