Small Fire Causes Metro Train to Stall
No injuries were reported
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WASHINGTON - APRIL 28: A Metro train departs from the Gallery Place - Chinatown Metro Station April 28, 2006 in Washington, DC. With gas prices soaring past $3.00 a gallon, there has been an increase in public transportation use across the United States. (Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images)
Passengers were evacuated from a Blue Line train after it had stalled in a tunnel due to a small fire.
A collector shoe -- transfers electricity from the third rail to the train -- on the lead car of the train got tangled with a communications cable in the tunnel, which caused the fire, according to Metro officials.
The train, which was headed in the direction of Franconia Springfield, got stuck in the tunnel outside of the Smithsonian Metro station. The fire was extinguished and passengers were taken through the rear of the Blue Line train to an Orange Line train that had pulled up behind the stalled train, Metro spokesperson Steven Taubenkibel told NBC4. The passengers were then brought to the L'Enfant Plaza station.
No injuries were reported.
Trains were single tracked between Smithsonian and Federal Center, with delays in both directions, while the incident was investigated.
Metro also had trouble with a collector shoe on a Red Line train last October. The shoe came off the lead rail car of a Red Line train after it left the Gallery Place-Chinatown station, causing sparks and explosion sounds.
Prior to that, in July, a collector shoe fell off an Orange Line train at McPherson Square station. That incident also caused sparks and a fire, which a train operator put out with an extinguisher.
