PS.

Take a look also at the catastrophic structural failure of the first car in the Chatsworth accident. The locomotive took most of the impact and still it totally failed.

Just imagine that big heavy UP freight hitting a MetroLink cab car first! The UP locos would definitely have gone through the entire cab car and into the next. That very likely scenario would easily have killed 100 to 150 people! Push-Pull with grade crossings and weak cars is PATENTLY UNSAFE!

I certainly do hope the NTSB is looking at the very real likelihood that these cars do not meet FRA crash standards, as their builders claimed. There is also no excuse whatever - for these cars to have broken open and failed so completely.

It wouldn't be the first time a certain French-Canadian car builder tried to compromise crash worthiness standards. They tried to pull this exact same stunt on Amtrak with the Acela trains, but Amtrak caught 'em at it - caused massive delays launching the Acela service. As incompetent as MetroLink obviously is, it is unlikely that they would have caught a similar attempt by the very same company that built MetroLink's cars.