Now my conjecture: Somewhere down the line, operations control had the wrong information despite it being provided to them accurately before the incident by one of the two victims. My guess is that the victim submitted a work order earlier in the day with c53 and c54 and changed the work order it to c40 and c50 before entering the tracks. The fact that he radio’d in his position and the dispatcher confirms the new location, makes me believe that a change in work order is common practice, or at the very least can be handled properly by operations control. However, the automated message makes me believe that either (A) information was entered incorrectly into the computer OR (B) nobody changed the work order in the computer. Either way, I think the computer had the wrong information or none at all. All of the BART trains are operated by computers. The train operators only hit the e-brakes and hold the “door-open” button to let people on and off the train. They can also press buttons that put speed-restrictions on the train. Now I may be exaggerating based on information I heard from BART management, but they aren’t holding down a gas-pedal so they can’t let off when they see something off. I don’t think the operator expected anyone on the track at that point of the incident (he wasn’t told anyone was there), so I can’t blame him. When workers foul the tracks, one person is supposed to be a flag man and watch out for trains. The worker who called in explicitly made note that he knew the third (power) rail was live and that he’d respect operational trains. So I guess he was expecting the speed restriction on his section of track which makes the train max out at 20 mph (or something similar) via computer control. So he wasn’t expecting a 70 mph train to barrel down the tracks. Obviously, neither saw or heard the vehicle which makes me think that they were both breaking protocol by not watching out, which is unfortunate, but 70 mph train moves 100 feet per second, so a two second lapse in vigilance and 200 feet visibility could be fatal. Especially when the track is next to a freeway (which it was) creating high background noise levels. In this scenario I can see two mistakes: (1) the computer controller had the wrong info and (2) the employees weren’t watching.
Of course, my conjecture is just that. I look forward to the full report to make sure this never happens again.

It’s a true shame this happened. My heart goes out to the families of the two deceased. Truly, these members of the BART community will be missed greatly. Their dedication to keeping the BART system running as good as possible will be missed.

There is an audio recording of the whole incident. A manager (not engineer) was directing the train. Very clear.