Metro’s blocked emergency exits need more attention

AT THE END OF an instructional slide show on Metro’s Web site that explains emergency evacuation procedures from buses and trains, passengers are assured that they are in good hands. “As you ride Metro, remember that you are not alone,” the presentation concludes, soothingly. “Our 10,000 employees are looking out for the safety of customers like you.”

That’s nice to hear. But any sanguine feelings are dashed by the news that Metro has repeatedly failed to fix a staggering array of problems with rail emergency exits, including locked, blocked and impassable doors and stairways — problems that would make it difficult, even impossible, for passengers to escape from train tunnels in a crisis.

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Even more outrageous is that the transit system failed to act despite repeated warnings from inspectors about the impediments.

The problems with Metrorail’s 121 emergency-exit shafts, detailed the other day in the Washington Examiner, suggest breathtaking institutional complacency. In some cases, Metro failed to deal with non-functioning emergency exits even after they were pointed out a half-dozen or more times by inspectors from the Tri-State Oversight Committee, Metro’s independent safety watchdog agency.

According to the Examiner, which reviewed hundreds of inspection reports from 2009 and 2010, Metro routinely ignored problems with emergency exits. In some cases, burned-out lights were left unchanged. An exit leading from a rail tunnel to the street at the Congress Heights station was left locked over the course of 15 months — despite a half-dozen inspections.

Various emergency exits were impeded by escalator parts, a coil of cable, diesel fuel cans, trash cans, a floor cleaner, a thick coating of mud, shrubs, six feet of vegetation and a shopping cart. More commonly, light bulbs were not working and, at about a third of stations, emergency-hatch doors leading to the street from tunnels were “overweight,” meaning that it would require more than 35 pounds of force to open them. The target for easy use is about 15 pounds.

Some of the problems date back two years or more; it is not clear how many remain unresolved. Metro has been less than transparent in dealing with safety problems in the past, and the evacuation exits in question are not open to the public except during emergencies.

What is clear is that Metro did not address these problems in a timely or systematic manner. A year ago, the Examiner reported, Metro told the independent safety agency that it had established procedures for ensuring emergency exits were functional and clear. However, Metro told the newspaper more recently that the system still isn’t operational — and won’t be for a few more months. In other words, there remains no real assurance that passengers who need to escape in an emergency will be able to reach the street.

Since September 2001, the agency has pumped millions of dollars into systems and procedures to address the threat of terrorist attack. But all that money and all that work are irrelevant if passengers can’t escape in the event of a fire, accident or bombing.