For the uninitiated, Metrolink, as well as many other commuter systems throughout the country, operates its commuter trains using the push-pulthe locomotive pushes the train from behind. Railroads do this to avoid the extra time, money and space needed to turn a train around at the end of a line.
When the train is running in push mode, a modified passenger car with an operation compartment built into the front leads the train down the track. The engineer then controls the train from this cab car.
Here is what the cab car looks like leading a train down a track. The engineer is sitting at the front right hand window as one would look out the front of the train.
And here is what the inside of the engineer's compartment looks like:
Compare this to the protection afforded the engineer and the passengers by a locomotive pulling the train!
It should not be surprising that in railroad parlance, the cab car is often referred to as the coffin car. Inevitably, trains will hit things on the track, whether they are there inadvertently or purposefully. And the 450-ton locomotive is more likely to protect those on the train, especially the engineer.
For one, the cab car weighs half as much, leaving it vulnerable to easily "floating" off the tracks, and it has virtually no crush distance. Plus it lacks a "cowcatcher." A cowcatcher is the v-shaped device attached to the front of a train to deflect obstacles (such as cows!) off the track. Metrolink does not have cowcatchers on its cab cars but only a flat end plate. This makes it easy for objects on the track to become wedged under the car.
However, officials insist that cab cars are safe, and they continue to be used throughout the country.
Metrolink 100, which hit the Jeep Grand Cherokee wedged on the tracks, was traveling in push mode, with Bruce Gray at the controls in the cab car, a car that literally became a coffin car.
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