Sarah Tew realized something might be wrong with her Wednesday morning commute on an N-Judah Muni train when a fellow passenger said they were moving unusually fast.
It wasn’t until the train hit an “S-shaped” curve in Sunset Tunnel that terror struck.
“We literally were all knocked to the floor,” she said in an interview. “I fell on top of random strangers, and random strangers fell on top of me.”
The train continued to accelerate and for Tew it felt as if the train had derailed and was going to crash into something.
“It felt like a runaway train,” she said. “It felt faster than anything, it had never gone even close to that fast.”
One moment that is cemented into her mind is seeing the terrified look on a girl’s face who was sitting across from her.
“She was wide-eyed and screaming,” Tew said. “I remember thinking, ‘Okay, I really might die right now. Brace yourself.’”
SFMTA acknowledges ‘alarming incident’
The San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency, the city department responsible for managing and operating San Francisco’s transportation system, waited until Thursday to make a statement on the incident. It didn’t go into details of what occurred.
“We know that Wednesday’s incident aboard the N-Judah leaving the Sunset Tunnel was alarming for our riders on that train, and we want to acknowledge the concern in caused,” SFMTA said.
A preliminary review showed that the train was “mechanically sound and operating as designed,” according to SFMTA.
Tew said the train came to a screeching halt after “blowing through” the Duboce & Noe train stop. Some passengers on board began yelling for the doors to open as smoke entered the car.
Everyone got off the train, including the driver who was “shaking,” Tew said.
“She was clearly in shock and freaking out,” Tew said.
As others were trying to console the driver, the driver apparently said that the brakes weren’t working and that she “tried everything,” according to Tew.
“Then as we looked toward the back of the train, the brakes and the wheels were smoking a lot, you could smell it and see it coming from the wheels,” Tew said. “So it seemed very much like a mechanical issue.”
Tew said that SFMTA’s lack of response to passengers and the public regarding what happened was “frustrating.”
“…As we looked toward the back of the train, the brakes and the wheels were smoking a lot, you could smell it and see it coming from the wheels.” Sarah Tew, N-Judah Muni passenger
Beyond the bruises she has from falling during the ride, the fear of riding Muni and lack of communication from SFMTA has been more distressing for her.
“It was more so the visceral shock of it all, and then the trauma of not hearing back from Muni about what happened,” she said.
SFMTA said it is investigating the cause of the train losing control and will provide updates as more information becomes known.