Metro North to Test All Train Engineers for Sleep Apnea

Written by Lanning Taliaferro (Patch Staff)

A year after the fatal derailment on the Hudson Line, Metro North has selected a health company to test all its engineers for sleep apnea.

It has been eight months since the National Transportation Safety Board determined that the engineer of the 7-car train had severe sleep apnea.

The derailment at 7:30 a.m. Dec. 2 killed four and injured nearly 60 people. The train was on its way to New York City from Poughkeepsie. The locomotive was on the north end pushing the cars southward. It took the curve—marked for 30 mph— at 80 mph.

Killed in the train derailment were James Lovell, 58, of Cold Spring; James Ferrari, 59, of Montrose; Donna Smith, 54, of Newburgh; and Ahn Kisook, 35, of Queens. A sound and lighting designer, Lovell was headed into NYC to work on the tree at Rockefeller Center.

A post-accident sleep study found that the engineer, William Rockefeller, suffers from severe sleep apnea.

A toxicology report determined that he also had traces of an over-the-counter antihistamine in his blood at the time of the crash. The medicine carries an FDA warning that states, “may impair mental and/or physical ability required for the performance of potentially hazardous tasks (e.g., driving, operating heavy machinery).”

Sleep apnea often goes undiagnosed, according to the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute.

“Sleep apnea usually is a chronic (ongoing) condition that disrupts your sleep. When your breathing pauses or becomes shallow, you’ll often move out of deep sleep and into light sleep,” the NHLBI states on its website. “As a result, the quality of your sleep is poor, which makes you tired during the day. Sleep apnea is a leading cause of excessive daytime sleepiness.”

According to the NTSB medical report, the sleep study revealed that Rockefeller had an apnea/hypopnea index (AHI) of 52.5 episodes per hour, and it climbed to as high as 67.5 episodes per hour.

The report states that more than 30 events per hour is considered severe sleep apnea.

Metro North’s sleep apnea testing pilot is part of its ongoing work to improve its operations called for by national regulatory agencies, officials and riders.

The Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) investigation and report, “Operation Deep Dive,” was commissioned following the deadly Metro-North derailment last December in the Bronx.

The agency’s report had “three overarching findings” regarding Metro-North’s operations:

• a “clear overemphasis on on-time performance to a detriment of safety”
• ineffective safety department and poor safety culture
  
• inadequate and ineffective training provided for workers

FRA head Joseph Szabo said at the time of the report’s release that the push to keep trains on the company’s revenue producing main line on schedule meant that high-quality track inspections, high-speed operation testing and track maintenance along the route were often not done — because that would result in temporarily shutting portions of the track down to running trains.

“Because of concern of delaying revenue service trains on the main line, they were not doing safety testing,” said Szabo.

Two of the region’s leading political figures also blasted Metro North at the time.

“The report confirms our worst fears: a severely lacking culture of safety at the railroad,” said U.S. Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) following the report’s release, sentiments echoed by U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-CT).

“For me the takeaway from this report is not that Metro-North cared too much about on-time performance, but that it cared too little about safety,” said Blumenthal at the time. “It can and should do both, both are feasible and achievable.”

Patch Editor Alfred Branch also contributed to this report.