NTSB Investigating Texting Involvement in Commuter Train Tragedy

By Michael Santo
Editor-in-Chief, RealTechNews

While some states have implemented hands-free cell phone laws for drivers, there hasn’t been such attention paid in terms of text messaging or emailing, despite studies that have found as many as 30% of drivers text while behind the wheel.

There have been auto accidents in which texting has been implicated (though not proven), but could last Friday’s tragic commuter rail crash be the final straw which ends up creating laws over texting while operating any sort of vehicle?

The NTSB is investing last Friday’s tragic collision between a commuter rail train and a freight train in Southern California. The crash resulted in 25 deaths. The NTSB is planning to review the cell phone records of two 14-year-old boys and the engineer after the teenagers told CBS2-TV that they received a text message from the engineer just prior to the crash.

The engineer, who was killed in the crash, ran a stop signal prior to the accident.

According to the LA Times,

A woman who identified herself as the mother of one of the teenagers, but asked that her name not be used to protect her 14-year-old son’s privacy, said that he and some of his friends often rode the Metrolink train on Friday afternoons and had become friendly with the engineer. Investigators had spoken to some of them, she said.

“They knew the engineer very well,” she said Sunday, “and they are mourning the loss of this gentleman. They all aspire to be engineers.”

At this point this is all conjecture. Investigators have not recovered the engineer’s cell phone, if it’s even in the wreckage. But while it’s all still unconfirmed, it’s true that last year a Harris Interactive study indicated 89% of those surveyed felt that texting while driving should be banned.

And while there may in fact be no connection, text messaging is far more distracting than a phone call while operating a vehicle. It makes sense that we should enforce a “no text messaging while operating any vehicle” law.

Why do we continue to wait on this? Do we really need an accident that we can be 100% confirmed to be caused by texting before we do the common-sense thing?

What do you readers think?