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Police: Driver in train crash may have been on cellphone

BY DAVID HENCH

BY DAVID HENCH

The Portland Press Herald

The driver of a trash truck who was killed when he collided with the Amtrak Downeaster July 11 may have been using a cell phone at the time, police said Monday.

Peter Barnum, 35, of Farmington, N.H., who was driving a trailer truck loaded with trash, collided with the northbound Amtrak train and was killed instantly. The train caught fire and several passengers and crew members received minor injuries.

The crash has been investigated by State Police, local police, Amtrak and the Federal Railroad Administration. The FRA said it will be months before its investigation is complete.

A press release issued by the North Berwick Police Department, which was designated as the lead department since the crash happened in that town, concludes that the "cause of this crash is driver inattention/distraction by the possible use of a mobile communication device by Mr. Barnum."

The release does not specify what kind of device Barnum might have been using or why police suspect that he was using one, whether they recovered an intact device at the crash scene or, if it was a cell phone, obtained records from the carrier.

An investigative report prepared by a North Berwick officer and approved Aug. 9 says Barnum disregarded a traffic signal and failed to yield. When noting what might have distracted the driver, if anything, the officer wrote "unknown."

The press release, issued by Lt. James Moulton, says that the gates and crossing signals were working prior to the crash and that a lengthy skid mark shows Barnum's efforts to stop prior to the collision.

The investigation was a cooperative effort by several police and federal agencies as well as Triumvirate Environ-mental, the trash hauling company for whom Barnum was driving, Moulton said.

Amtrak has sued Triumvirate in federal court in Massachusetts for $3 million, which it says is the cost of replacing the Amtrak engine and cars that were damaged.

"With the pending litigation, the company is not going have any comment on this today," Hugh Drummond, a spokesman for Triumvirate Environmental said Monday .

Barnum was hauling 25 tons of trash from Kittery to the incinerator in Biddeford, and was headed down a long hill on Elm Street approaching the tracks, just before the crash happened. Barnum tried to stop, leaving a 75-yard skid mark, and the truck's cab slid around the gates and collided with the front of the train, the force of the crash disintegrating much of the cab.

The crash happened at 11:05. The northbound train, consisting of an engine and passenger cars carrying 112 passengers and four railroad employees, would typically have been traveling about 70 mph. The release does not indicate how fast Barnum was driving when he first tried to stop the truck, a 2009 Kenworth and had recently been inspected.

Train traffic will be disrupted on Thursday so that maintenance workers can work on the section of track where the crash occurred. Trains have continued to run 30 mph through that area, as opposed to the 70 mph they would usually travel there, said Patricia Quinn, executive director of the Northern New England Passenger Rail Authority, which operates the Downeaster service.

On Thursday, the two morning trains to Boston will head out as usual, then the tracks will be shut down there for 10 hours so some ties can be replaced and other improvements made, she said.

"We have not been back up to speed since the incident occurred. This is trying to get that track back up so we can go at operating speed," she said. The work should be complete by the time the 5:40 p.m. train heads north out of Boston.

Riders whose routes are disrupted by the track work will be able to take buses, she said.