A New York City subway train derailed Thursday after colliding with another train at low speed, leaving more than 20 people with minor injuries and causing major service disruptions across Manhattan during the afternoon rush hour, authorities said.

At about 3 p.m. on the Upper West Side, a 1 train carrying about 300 passengers and an out-of-service Metropolitan Transportation Authority train with four workers on board hit each other near the 96th Street station, police and transit officials said at the scene. A “derailment” is when at least one wheel of a train leaves the track.

Photos posted on social media by city emergency management officials showed the passenger train partially off the tracks in an area that had a track-switching mechanism. Officials said there were no immediate signs of equipment failure and investigators were seeing if human error was involved.

  • @Nurse_Robot
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    2210 months ago

    I’m pretty ignorant about this. How tf is this even possible?

    • TimLovesTech (AuDHD)(he/him)
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      2610 months ago

      Sounds kinda like the same thing with above ground trains, someone didn’t run the correct track and ran into a out-of-service train. Says right in the article that it happened near a track switch, so likely human error/someone didn’t get the memo on don’t go track “A” go track “B” today kinda thing.

      • zeekaran
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        2010 months ago

        Honestly why are humans even there to make these decisions? It’s a train

        • @breakingcups
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          2010 months ago

          IIRC the NY subway is infamous for running on ridiculously outdated, patchwork tech because they aren’t allowed to shut down long enough to implement the necessary modern improvements, nor does the MTA get the funds to do so.

          There are plenty of subway systems where this could never have happened.

          • @[email protected]
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            1310 months ago

            Indeed, the whole system is massively complex and serves a megacity with one of the world’s oldest systems 24/7. Maintenance is insanely costly and difficult. It’s like repairing airplanes while in flight.

            • @dumpsterlid
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              610 months ago

              I believe the New York subway system moves about the same amount of riders per day as the entire US continental air travel system. Imagine trying to keep that whole thing running when it is a political target that rich people use as basically a dog whistle for shitting on poor people. You also have to put these kinds of accidents into perspective with that kind of magnitude of rides that went perfectly fine.

              • TimLovesTech (AuDHD)(he/him)
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                410 months ago

                The subway has a daily ridership of approximately 3.2 million.

                With an average of 2.56 million passengers per day passing through TSA checkpoints

                Yep, more by over a half million people more per day on the subway in one city. =)

                • @dumpsterlid
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                  210 months ago

                  It is a pretty mind blowing technological achievement even though plenty of other cities have better systems, the numbers are just so big for subways.

        • @muntedcrocodile
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          810 months ago

          Because upgrading to an automated system costs too much.

          Not enough money to do it right but enough to do it twice.

    • aubertlone
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      -810 months ago

      Train was going too fast, lack of maintenance on the track, etc etc

      Surprisingly similar to standard train derailments.

      • @RedditWanderer
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        310 months ago

        Nowhere does it mention he was going too fast, and the article clearly says there are no signs of mechanical failure, and they are looking into human error.

        It’s more likely he missed the memo to switch tracks during maintenance because the old NY subway doesn’t have an automated system.

        • aubertlone
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          210 months ago

          The other person asked what common reasons for subway car derailment were, I wasn’t speaking specifically to this incident.

          That being said this, thanks for the clarification.

  • @[email protected]
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    310 months ago

    The out-of-service train had been stuck because someone pulled a number of emergency stop cords and the workers were on board to reset the brake cords, said Richard Davey, president of New York City transit for the MTA.

    Probably some kid doing some stupid joke