As my sister-in-law was one of the fatalities, the idea that the only way to prevent head on collisions between trains relies solely on the ability of the train engineer to stop his train, something is somewhat amiss.

This stretch of track is infamous in LA for the number of train accidents, including things like jumping rails to the track designated for trains traveling in the opposite direction. The fix for this little conundrum was apparently removing the second track and have trains traveling both ways use the same one.

I'm with those that wonder why we can't automatically stop a train that approaches a red light, especially given that text messaging is simply one amongst hundreds of different reasons why an engineer might be unable to stop his train.

Needless to say this being the US, lawsuits are forthcoming, and having spoken to Metrolink myself, very much expected. Just the simple idea that two trains, traveling in opposite directions, can legitimately exist on the same track without some sort of automated emergency response is enough for me to say on this occasion I have a lot of sympathy for those filing them.

Especially given that I personally know the husband, son and daughter of one of the deceased. Certainly mine is biased opinion, but I don't remember too many occasions back home in England where two fast moving trains traveling towards each other were allowed to share a track. At least not where automatic fail safe technology wasn't employed if the driver or engineer became incapacitated in some way.