Now to Hoboken, where National Transportation Safety Board investigators say they have finally been able to recover crucial evidence that could hold keys to the crash. NJTV News Correspondent Erin Delmore was at the NTSB briefing. She spoke to Anchor Mary Alice Williams.
Williams: What did you learn?
Delmore: Mary Alice, investigators are saying they recovered working recorders that could show why an NJ Transit train jumped the bumper at the end of its track and crashed less than a week ago. Around 10:30 this morning, NTSB investigators were able to enter the lead car of that train and from there they recovered an event recorder, a video recorder and the personal effects of the conductor, including a cell phone tucked into a backpack. They took those effects and they sent them to the NTSB lab in Washington D.C. where they were retrieved around 3 p.m. today and we’ve been told they’ve been examined already.
Williams: What’s next, Erin?
Delmore: Well we don’t have the results of that examination. The NTSB has said that while these events occur quickly, the investigations themselves take time. In fact an investigator today described the event and the investigation that has followed as a “well-orchestrated industrial ballet”. He said the movements of his team back and forth has taken considerable planning. Chief among that today he said he studied a report last night showing that the air quality and the structural integrity of that lead car did make the environment safe enough to enter. That investigator also told us that from an investigative standpoint there’s no perishable evidence inside that first car. He said the evidence would not have suffered in the couple days wait that has occurred. He also said that the investigative team has been wrapping up its work, now they’re going to take their artifacts and their equipment to a facility nearby. They’re going to continue working but they’re going to vacate the scene. That said, they’re going to remain in Hoboken until all the wreckage is cleared, which they expect will take a couple of days.
Williams: What’s the mood at Hoboken Terminal at rush hour?
Delmore: It’s a decidedly different atmosphere than what we saw less than a week ago. People here are walking along at a slower pace. They’re making their way to this train station and we don’t see any of the frenzy or anxiety that we saw less than a week ago. New York and New Jersey commuters are resilient and you see that resiliency on display tonight.