Breakdown in tunnel snarls Northeast trains

  Eyewitness News

(New York - WABC, November 18, 2007) (WABC) -- Train traffic on the Northeast rail corridor was disrupted for hours Sunday by an electrical breakdown in a Hudson River tunnel linking New York's Pennsylvania Station to New Jersey.

Damage to overhead electrical wires halted a passenger train about 8:30 a.m., initially blocking New Jersey Transit service and stranding passengers on one northbound train for nearly 2 1/2 hours.

The ripple effect of the shutdown was soon felt as southbound Amtrak trains arriving from Boston backed up at New York's Penn Station, and northbound trains from Philadelphia and points south got as far as Newark before they, too, were forced to halt.

Service was restored not long after 3 p.m., but the delays extended into the afternoon. By 4 p.m., trains were moving to and from Penn Station.

Dan Stessel, a New Jersey Transit spokesman, said its northbound service resumed about 2:30 p.m. after the outage stalled more than 24 trains with an estimated 17,000 riders.

Amtrak spokeswoman Tracy Connell said she did not know how many Amtrak trains or passengers were affected by the impasse. Amtrak normally carries about 36,000 passengers a day in the northeast corridor, but fewer on weekends, she said.

The Tuesday and Wednesday before Thanksgiving are traditionally the rail system's heaviest travel days of the year, but the Sunday before the holiday is not noticeably busier than other Sundays, Connell said.

Amtrak and New Jersey Transit share the same tracks between New York and Newark, N.J. A parallel tunnel that normally might be used was closed for track maintenance, Connell said. Stessel said this was a routine practice on weekends and the second, or south tunnel, was reopened ahead of time on Sunday to help ease "a lot of congestion, especially Amtrack trains, backed up in Newark."

Neither NJ Transit nor Amtrak could immediately describe the nature of the malfunction that halted traffic.

During the stoppage, Amtrak and NJ Transit passengers could attempt to make the river crossing by switching to the PATH train system, which uses different tunnels to connect Manhattan to Newark. PATH was honoring both NJ Transit and Amtrak tickets during the emergency.

To make the connection, passengers had to lug their bags above ground and walk several Manhattan blocks.

Amtrak carries about 69,000 customers a day nationwide, about half of those in the northeast corridor.

Get more News »

• Email
• Print
• Report a typo
•