Feds, local police probe subway smoke incident, death
WASHINGTON — The National Transportation Safety Board and local police continue to investigate an incident that left one woman dead and dozens injured when smoke filled a subway train at the L'Enfant Plaza station during Monday's rush hour.
Two people initially were in critical condition and another 84 people were treated for smoke inhalation and various injuries at Washington-area hospitals, according to the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority. One firefighter also was injured, according to the District of Columbia Fire and Emergency Medical Services Department, whose staffers evaluated more than 200 people.
"Please know that once the cause of this incident is understood, we are prepared to take the actions needed to prevent this from happening again," Tom Downs, chairman of the transit authority board, said in a statement. He also offered an apology to riders who continued to feel the effect on their commutes Tuesday.
But passengers had a multitude of unanswered questions: Was the train's evacuation unnecessarily delayed? Were passengers given the right information? And what caused the death of the woman?
The woman who died was identified Tuesday as Carol Glover, 61, of Alexandria, Va. The D.C. Medical Examiner's Office has not released a cause of death.
Glover was analyst for a DKW Communications, an information technology company that does work for the government, and was working on a contract with the U.S. Department of Agriculture at the time of her death, said her supervisor, Cliff Andrews.
"She passed out. It was obvious she passed out," said Jonathan Rogers, who helped perform cardio-pulmonary resuscitation on a woman that he believes was Glover. A few of us were rotating doing compressions, mouth to mouth, and we did it for like 20 minutes and eventually, it wasn't doing anything. ... I wish we could have done more for her."
On Tuesday afternoon, the two patients in critical condition were upgraded to serious and fair condition, according to MedStar Washington Hospital Center, where 18 of the victims were treated.
"Most patients will be fine," said Dr. Jeffrey Shupp, one of 20 physicians at the hospital who treated the victims. "They'll probably have some symptoms of cough, maybe some upper respiratory, chest tightness. But most of that will leave them in seven to 14 days."
Luis Clemens, 47, a National Public Radio editor, said he was among a group of passengers who got off the train and walked back to the subway platform through the pitch-black tunnel despite instructions to stay on board. He said it seemed obvious, after what felt like 20 or 30 minutes, that the train wasn't going to move.
"We were not given any information that police or fire were en route or nearby," he said. "All we got was, 'Stay in place. Yes, I know there's smoke. Don't leave.' And that doesn't make a whole lot of sense when you're sitting there watching over some period, watching the subway cars fill up with smoke."
Many of the subway passengers treated for smoke inhalation entered the hospitals with soot-covered faces.
The District's Metropolitan Police Department is investigating because of the fatality, the first death from a transit incident since a 2009 crash that killed eight passengers and a train operator, and the NTSB is part of the probe because the incident involves a transit system, officials said.
An electrical arcing involving the high-voltage third rail led a train to stop in a tunnel at about 3:30 p.m. ET Monday and quickly filled the tunnel with smoke, NTSB investigator Michael Flanigon said. An arcing occurs when electricity from the third rail comes into contact with another substance that conducts electricity, such as water.
While water was in the tunnel, Flanigon said the cause of the arcing was not yet known.
"The third rail is high-voltage direct current, and if that current starts arcing to another conductor that it is not designed to connect with, you get a flash," Flanigon said. "In certain cases, that arc can start sort of feeding on itself, and it actually generates gases that are more conductive."
No fire was reported though smoke filled the Northern Virginia-bound Yellow Line train after it stopped in a tunnel 150 feet south of L'Enfant Plaza station, said Richard Sarles, the transit authority's general manager and chief executive.
About 30 minutes into the ordeal, Andrew Litwin, 21, a University of Texas student visiting the Washington area, said a fellow rider reached 911 on a cellphone.
He said the news that firefighters were aware of the problem calmed passengers, who had been yelling, "We're going to die here!"
L'Enfant Plaza is a major transfer station for Washington's Metro, and five of the subway system's six lines funnel through it. Only the Red Line, which does not go through L'Enfant Plaza, faced no delays Tuesday.
The Metrorail system, which connects Washington with its Maryland and Virginia suburbs, carries an average of 721,000 passengers each weekday.
Smoke and fire are not unusual on the subway system, which opened in 1976 and still uses some original rail cars. Metro's most recent safety reports showed 86 incidents of smoke or fire in 2013 and 85 through the first eight months of 2014.
"I don't think there's a lot of trust in how Metro handled this situation," said Devin Krotman, a rider getting off Tuesday at the L'Enfant station.
Contributing: The Associated Press