Hey Cosmo,

Or should I say Brett, Tim is not a good guy or a good engineer. Good engineers don't run red signals AND be arrogant about it. He may be a good friend, but that's between you two. As for myself I don't like him as an employee, and substandard would be too polite of a description of his abilities as an engineer. I, like everyone else, am not perfect. However, when I do screw up I don't go walking around telling everyone that it's their problem and not mine. He's got student engineer evaluations a mile long that all say he should never be marked up as an engineer. Management knew and still knows he's a bad engineer but refused to do anything about it.

Now, as for how the switch was lined at the time of the incident, yes it was lined for the inside track. The signal and switch was "in time" and was a few minutes away from lining up for 717. The DS had 14 lined up for departure when 717 showed up in his territory. The DS took the signal and lineup down from 14 and "ran time" on the switch so that 717 could be lined up. This is a normal operation and has been handled well by countless other engineers.

As for the "what if" PTC would have helped in this situation, answer is yes. The on board computer would have seen that 717 was approaching the signal way too fast and stopped it.