It was two subjects with the verb understood, not a compound sentence, but I have added “are” for clarity. Thanks, Paul of Covington!
Poor alcohol testing program but some worry about a veteran who is treated with a dog?
If it makes you feel any better, Hunter Harrison would have treated the service dog the same way he treated the drug and alcohol testing program.
Hunter Harrison was a jerk.
A very successful jerk…
The engineer was a jerk for putting the lives of others in danger. Sure, the drug and alcohol baby sitting mechanism wasn’t as robust and effective as it should be… and we can always blame positive train control and how CSX should not have allowed the train to proceed in restricted mode. But ultimately it was the engineer’s responsibility to show up for work free of drugs and sober…too much to ask?
Is success only measured by operating ratio? Is a dysfunctional transportation mode’s boss that loses customers by the droves a success?
So Harrison pulled the plug on safety, and nobody realized it until this collision?
It was realized every time a directive came out of his office that cancelled prior practices and procedures. That being said, of Officers, it was EHH’s way or the highway. Don’t do it Hunter’s way and you are now unemployed.
Fish rot from the head. Hunter was rotting the day he assumed control of CSX.
Suspect the Engineer was ‘Hunter’s kind of guy’ - show up drunk and keep on drinking - but he showed up. Safety was just a word with no meaning to EHH.
At CP Hunter did fire an engineer who was involved in a similar incident… engineer was high. CP was ordered to give the engineer his job back after completing a drug rehab program… Hunter defied the government… “not putting this person at the controls of a locomotive” or words to that affect. Like him or not, I don’t think this is Hunter’s fault… Likely what will happen now (thanks to this engineer)… positive train control will become further restrictive… the drug and alcohol testing will become more robust,frequent, and pervasive… and maybe an inward facing camera or six to make sure that the person at the controls is doing his/her job properly. and you can thank this engineer for that because through his irresponsible actions he pointed out the need for more controls.
CSX was at fault? Did CSX made drinking a requirement of the job? I worked through EHH’s time, and somehow I made it to work sober every day. It is sad that personal responsibility ranks so low for not only Charlie, but the NTSB as well.
Also, when the accident happened, EHH had been dead for almost as long as he had been with CSX.
Strange that the conductor didn’t notice the engineer was intoxicated.
From the linked article:
"…the safety board said the engineer would have been significantly impaired, may have been drinking on the job, and likely had a blood alcohol level of between 0.2% and 0.3% at the time of the collision. He no longer works for CSX, a railroad spokeswoman says.
The engineer’s blood alcohol level was 0.11% when tested six hours after the wreck, the board said. In all but one state, a driver of a motor vehicle is considered legally intoxicated at 0.08%…"
I thought that .20% was falling down drunk and .30% was passed out/ near death from alcohol poisoning? This appears to be be someone with some longterm experience with alcohol abuse. I’m curious why the other person in the cab didn’t catch on tho the engineer’s behavior.
From the short article:
The FRA told the NTSB that deficiencies in CSX’s drug and alcohol testing program were traced in part to then-CEO E. Hunter Harrison’s implementation of Precision Scheduled Railroading, which resulted in a 22% reduction in the railroad’s employment levels, including among the field-level operations personnel who were supposed to administer the tests.
So with some people it is not like a Foster Brooks act. They are very good at hiding intoxication and you cannot really tell the difference between sober and drunk. Plus his percentages were below .10 which makes concealment easier. You have to be falling down drunken stupor with a professional alcholic usually before people notice and usually professional alcholics do not take it that far. Roughly the same with some habitual cocaine users. Had cocaine users in the Army in the 1980’s and aside from the overdose in caffine jitteriness and bloodshot eyes (you had to be close). You really could not tell they were on drugs. That is why random and unannounced testing programs in the Army are used…and it seemed every single time they had one conducted across a Bn of 500 men…they netted a few drug users each time. They had them at least once a quarter.
Likel those deficiencies now corrected or will be shortly. Sadly every employee who came to work clean and sober will now have to put up with more screening as well…
https://lmgtfy.com/?q=personal+responsibility
The engineer in question had not been tested in 5 years at the time of the accident. EHH had been CEO for 9 months, and dead another 8 months before the accident.
“The engineer’s blood alcohol level was 0.11% when tested six hours after the wreck”
I’m guessing that’s why it said IN PART?
Nobody is arguing that the engineer is repsonsible. But NTSB looks at all contributory factors. Anyone want to discuss restricted mode in PTC?
And if he was drinking vodka which has no odor the engineer wouldn’t have “booze breath” which would have tipped off the conductor that something was very wrong.
“Booze breath” has given away airline pilots who violated the “Twelve hours between the bottle and the throttle” rule.