DuPont train crash survivor suing Amtrak; alleges company knew of electrical failure

Amtrak knew there was an electrical problem with a passenger train before it derailed in Pierce County last December, killing three people and injuring dozens of others.

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That’s an argument made by the lawyer for one passenger who is now suing Amtrak. Rudolf Wetzel was on the train that derailed near DuPont in December 2017. He filed a lawsuit Thursday against the railroad company. Wetzel is 81 years old and survived the Holocaust. He reports severe permanent injuries to his head, face, and spine as a result of the train crash.

“This is the closest I have had to not being here, the way I remember the situation,” Wetzel said. “I would have been crushed if that gully had not been there.”

“Compared to many of the other people, I did not get hurt that much, but I am hurting,” he said. “Normally, I escape these kinds of things and just brush it off, but this time I got caught.”

“I think(Amtrak is) going to have to wake up,” he added. “I think I have ridden the train four times since the event. I feel comfortable. This, whatever it was, it was a total goof off. This should not have happened.”

Allegation: Amtrak knew of electrical failure

Attorney Jim Vucinovik represents Wetzel. He says that Amtrak was aware of an electrical failure on the train before it departed from Seattle for Portland the morning of December 18, 2017. He alleges that the way Amtrak employees dealt with the problem could have made the crash more severe.

“Amtrak knew that there was an electrical failure of that train set before it was put into service that morning,” Vucinovik said.

“There was a shutdown between the head-end locomotive and the rear locomotive which are normally linked electronically,” he said. “Rather than fix that, or get to the root cause of that problem, they de-linked that rear unit which then meant that the rear locomotive unit was not available for braking and/or throttle effect.”

Vucinovik says that, because of this malfunction, the locomotive should have never been put into service that day.

“As that rear unit, which weighs 140 tons, is not slowed with the rest of the train, that is going to come crashing into the rear end of the train (cars),” Vucinovik said. “Which could have contributed to the accordion-like damage that you saw at the scene.”

It was Amtrak’s inaugural run on the Point Defiance Bypass route that day. The new route promised faster service to Portland. The passenger train was traveling 78 mph when it entered into a sharp curve in the tracks. It then derailed. Three people were killed and 62 other passengers were injured.

The crash has been under investigation of the National Transportation Safety Board.