Metro's Chief Mechanical Officer Reported 7000-Series Railcar Faults As Warranty Issues

WASHINGTON, DC — A federally appointed watchdog said the Washington Area Metropolitan Transit Authority did not intentionally fail to make public two faults in the wheel sets of 7000-series railcars that occurred in 2017 and after.

Geoffrey Cherrington, WMATA's inspector general, told the House Subcommittee on Government Operations during a hearing on Wednesday morning that a chief mechanical officer had discovered the two faults in the railcars. Rather than notifying his superiors, he instead chose to report it as a warranty issue.

"Nevertheless, increased frequency of back-to-back failures year over year should have raised concerns beyond the chief mechanical officer," Cherrington said, in his opening remarks "WMATA managed defects as warranty claims, not as safety hazard or safety concerns. WMATA's warranty processes were disconnected from safety certification processes.

Based on the Office of the Inspector General's investigation, the practice of reporting the faults as warranty issues continued over the next several years, even though a total of 29 similar failures occurred up to 2021.

"Kawasaki did not provide failure analysis reports upon learning of failures in the wheel sets," Cherrington said. "OIG is still examining the reasons for this."

Cherrington added that WMATA needed to work the Washington Metrorail Safety Commission, which is charged by Congress to provide oversight of the rail system, in defining program standards.

WMATA General Manager Paul Wiedefeld told the subcommittee the reported cases in 2017 were just two defects found out of the 3,000 wheel sets Metro inspected.

"They were doing every 90 days inspection of all wheels on all the 7000s," Cherrington said. "That was the protocol. During that process, during that year, at one of those intervals, they flagged one of these wheels that was out of alignment."

Wiedefeld told committee members a system needed to be established in which Metro mechanics and other operations personnel would monitor any safety component on either rail or bus. If a fault occurred, it needed to be flagged up the chain.

"That's what we're creating, in effect, moving a lot of things from the paper side to a digital side," he said. "So, in effect, we can monitor this live and do that on a number of other issues that could potentially have safety-related issues."

Metro has been under scrutiny ever since a Blue Line train derailed between the Rosslyn and Arlington National Cemetery stations in Virginia on Oct. 12, 2021.

Within a few days of the incident, National Transportation and Safety Bureau inspectors identified problems with the wheel sets of Metro's 7000-series railcars.

Based on the inspector's preliminary findings, officials ordered WMATA to remove all 7000-series trains from service. This led to a nearly 60 percent reduction in Metro's rail fleet, resulting to months of reduced service and daily delays for the system's riders.

Related: 60% Of Metro's Fleet Removed From Service Over Safety Concerns

During its initial investigation, NTSB discovered that WMATA was aware of 52 failures of 7000-series cars going back to 2017, which the transit provider failed to make public.

Working with the NTSB, WMSC identified 20 other 7000-series railcars with their wheels too far apart.

"Metrorail told us for the first time that routine inspections in the 12 months leading up to the derailment found 21 instances of wheels too far apart," said Dr. David Mayer, CEO of the Washington Metrorail Safety Commission, told the subcommittee. "Metrorail also said that it had also found similar failures dating back to 2017. These inspection failures were not disclosed as part of our rail car audit conducted just prior to the derailment and Metrorail did not communicate this to us during many of our other regular interactions."

In the subsequent months, the safety commission continued to monitor Metro's efforts to identify and fix the problems with the 7000-series trains and approved the system's return-to-service plan.

On Dec. 14, the safety commission approved a plan to begin a gradual reintroduction of 7000-series to service over a 90-day period, with weekly inspections of every car. However, just nine days later, Metro pulled all those trains out of service again and began nightly inspections.

"Using our direct access to Metrorail systems, we identified that Metrorail had put at least five railcars into service that did not comply with its plan," Mayer said.

Based on these findings and that fact that WMATA altered the previous return-to-service plan without its consent, the safety commission halted the process of returning trains to service. WMATA must now provide an updated plan for the safety commission's approval that will outline how it will safety return the 7000-trains to service.

In his opening remarks, U.S. Rep Gerry Connolly (D), who chairs the subcommittee and represents a large number of federal employees in Northern Virginia, said Metro is suffering from a culture of mediocrity.

"As the system has jumped from crisis to crisis, this culture has been a common theme," he said. "Falsified track inspection reports, failure to document or investigate more than 3,000 criminal complaints from riders. And now, a very difficult defect with 60 percent of the system's railcar fleet allowed to languish for four years."

In recent years, WMATA received more than $2.4 billion in emergency federal funding through The Cares Act, The Supplemental Appropriations Act and the American Rescue Plan. WMATA will also receive an additional $80 million to $100 million in annual capital formula money over the next five years.

Connolly called for Wednesday's hearing to examine the urgent safety priorities in Metro and identify structural reforms to advance a system of accountability.

"Failure of WMATA is not an option," he said. "We need a successful, functioning WMATA that returns to a culture of excellence."