A Metrorail operator who was arrested last year for driving a train under the influence of alcohol had been at the controls of a Blue Line train for hours, and a supervisor who spent time in the car with the driver saw no signs something was wrong, according to a new report from the Washington Metrorail Safety Commission.
The man, whose name Metro has not released, was riding a train on the afternoon of Friday, December 23, when it skipped the Van Dorn Street station in Alexandria. He then stopped the train for about 40 minutes, requiring passengers to call 911 before he finally let them off at the Franconia-Springfield station.
According to the safety commission report, that day the driver worked a double shift and struck out for the first time at 9:40 am to work in a railway depot. He was not ordered to drive any train during that time and he sat in his car for most of the shift, according to the report.
For the second half of his shift, he was due to report to the Hungtington police station at 5:28 pm, but he was two hours late.
Soon after, he was picked up by a train with another engineer and a railway supervisor inside. The engineer took charge of the train at King Street station and drove it to the center of Largo.
During the ride, the train stopped short of the end of the platform at several stations, including 32 feet from Potomac Avenue and 28 feet from Capitol South, according to the report.
The railway supervisor was riding the train with the engineer through the Stadium-Armory station, but later said during investigative interviews that they saw no indication that the driver was intoxicated, according to the safety commission.
At the Downtown Largo station, the driver got off and went to the terminal area to take a break. CCTV then caught him showing signs of wear, such as swaying and apparently unable to walk in a straight line, as he walked down the platform to get back on the train and drive it to the Franconia-Springfield station, according to The report.
The safety commission also noted that the operator’s driving became more irregular at subsequent stops, as at one point the train stopped tens of meters away and, at King Street station, operated the doors without looking. through the window, which is mandatory for security reasons.
At the Van Dorn Street station, the engineer passed the platform in two cars and stopped briefly before continuing without opening the doors.
About a mile after Van Dorn, at about 10:30 p.m., the train came to a halt and remained so for 40 minutes, during which time the operator failed to respond to repeated attempts by a passenger and the rail traffic controller to by radio to contact him, according to the security commission.
At 11:12 pm, the controller instructed another train with a rail supervisor, a Metro Transit Police officer, and medics to proceed to the train and unload the 18 passengers on board. But the engineer woke up and finished the trip to Franconia-Springfield around 11:20 p.m.
Traffic police officers then prevented the operator from driving the train back to downtown Largo and Metro employees saw signs that he was intoxicated, according to the report.
The driver failed alcohol tests at the Fairfax County Jail after being arrested, and Metro fired him.
The safety commission said it had several safety issues since it became an operator in 2019, including a collision in January 2020.
Since the incident on December 20, 2022, Metro has begun applying a procedure to determine an employee’s fitness for duty when reporting for the second half of a split shift.
The safety commission concluded that the transit agency could have provided a faster response to the problem if staff had detected the overrun and lack of service at the Van Dorn Street station and acted accordingly.
Metrorail could also study the possibility of developing procedures to deal with situations in which an operator is not in communication with the Rail Operations Control Center, the safety commission concluded.