Metro News Release

For immediate release: November 29, 2004

Repairs to defective tracks result in Red Line delays this morning

Metrorail’s Red Line customers experienced delays this morning while Metro personnel made repairs tracks that were found to be defective during middle-of-the-night track inspections.

A Metro contractor who conducts specialized track inspections while the Metrorail system is closed to customers, identified three separate hairline fractures in three separate locations along the tracks between the Bethesda and Friendship Heights Metrorail stations while testing those tracks last night. The problem was discovered at 2:37 a.m.--approximately two and one half hours before the rail system opened.

"We are sorry for the delays. We needed to act once the defective rail was identified. Unfortunately the repair work that had to be done took us into the time period when our system opened to the public," explained Steve Feil, Metro’s Chief Operating Officer for Rail.

Metro personnel began immediately making repairs to the outbound tracks headed in the direction of Shady Grove (please note this was outbound track, a correction from what we reported earlier) however they were unable to complete the work by the time the Metrorail system opened to customers at 5 a.m. Two of the three pieces of track where hairline fractures were located have been fixed. The third piece will be replaced tonight after the Metrorail system closes.

This morning Metro officials single-tracked trains between Van Ness-UDC and Medical Center Metrorail stations from opening until 6:34 a.m. to move customers around the track work that was being performed. This resulted in major delays in both directions on the Red Line until about 7:30 a.m.

Red Line riders who entered the Metrorail system after 8 a.m. should not have experienced any delays as a result of the incident.

Red Line customers who were offloaded at Rhode Island Avenue Metrorail station this morning at about 7:45 a.m. were delayed by a train that experienced a brake malfunction. That problem was not related to the track defect at the other end of the Red Line.

News release issued on November 29, 2004.