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South Station fire alarms ring, you know just what that will bring
By adamg on Fri, 06/07/2019 - 4:57pm
Tweets from Keolis initially blamed delays on commuter-rail service out of South Station on "fire department activity," but the rail operator reported at 4:39 p.m.:
[A]pologies for the lack of communication. It appears the fire alarm went off in South Station which is causing delays across several trains.
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Comments
Good thing fare increases are
Good thing fare increases are coming yet again.
deja vu...
Pretty sure the same thing happened last week: the fire alarms went off at South Station at the start of evening rush hour and the dispatchers had to evacuate the building, so all southbound trains were delayed.
Wonder if it’s trash fires down on the subway tracks or someone pulling the alarm in the main building during rush hour?
Anyway, the delays seem to be all cleared up now!
Did dispatch move?
Did dispatch move? It was at South Bay Tower. That is a rather nondescript looking structure that looks like a permanent trailer along the Fairmount line yard tracks in the vicinity of Widett Circle. The block operators were there a few years back for sure.
Block operators are the people on the radio that talk to the trains and have computers and displays that show them the condition of signals and the locations of trains.
Operations Center
There hasn’t been a Block Operator at South Bay Tower for almost 10 years. South Bay Interlocking is controlled remotely from South Station. Train Dispatchers have never been located at South Bay. The Amtrak/Keolis joint Train Dispatching and Operations Managers have always been located at South Station.
A simple thing like a toaster oven accidentally burning food in a “break room”has caused an alarm and evacuation of South Station in the past. Burnt English muffins have and can impact thousands of commuters.
They're upstairs, on the top
They're upstairs, on the top floor, probably why they have to leave for every alarm, regardless
The conductor on needham line
The conductor on needham line came on the PA and said that the dispatchers has to be evacuated while the fire department did their thing and made sure that there was no fire. I’m not sure everyone believed the conductor since no one else in south station had to evacuate. The lights from alarm we’re going off during one this weeks morning commute. Clearly there’s some sort of problem or there is work/construction being done on the building that is causing them to keep going off.
The other commenters are
The other commenters are correct about the location of dispatch.
A fire in the subway station would not impact the Commuter Rail/Amtrak station building.
They are separate structures, and are on separate fire alarm systems.