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News / Northwest

Amtrak resumes service on route where 3 died in 2017

By Associated Press
Published: November 19, 2021, 7:33am
2 Photos
The northbound Amtrak Cascades train rolls across the Interstate 5 overpass in DuPont, Wash., on Thursday, Nov. 18, 2021.
The northbound Amtrak Cascades train rolls across the Interstate 5 overpass in DuPont, Wash., on Thursday, Nov. 18, 2021. (Tony Overman /The News Tribune via AP) Photo Gallery

TACOMA — Nearly four years after an Amtrak train derailed and killed three people on a new route through Pierce County, service began again on the Point Defiance Bypass.

The News Tribune reports Amtrak Cascades trains traveled north and south through the corridor Thursday, crossing on a trestle that spans Interstate 5 south of DuPont.

On Dec. 18, 2017, nearly all of the passenger cars derailed from a southbound train that had just left a new station at Tacoma’s Freighthouse Square.

It was the inaugural run for the new corridor.

Investigators found fault with all the agencies involved in governing the track and service. Those agencies have implemented new safety controls and upgraded training.

A total of eight trains — including Amtrak Cascades and Coast Starlight — will use the bypass daily, Amtrak said.

Since the derailment, trains have been using the historical route that goes along Tacoma’s waterfront, underground through Ruston, along the shore past the Narrows and through Steilacoom.

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