Photo by Adam Fagen.
An electrical “arcing” event involving an insulator at Ballston sent Arlington firefighters to the Metro station this morning, causing delays for some Metro riders.
Orange/Silver Line: Trains are single tracking btwn Clarendon & Ballston due to a track problem outside Ballston. Delays both directions.
— Metrorail Info (@Metrorailinfo) January 16, 2015
WMATA spokesman Dan Stessel tells DCist in an email that they “notified Arlington Fire of an insulator that was arcing” and that “the arcing stopped as soon as third rail power was removed.” According to Stessel, the fire department just vacated the station and it remains open as trains are servicing, but the incident caused single-tracking of Blue, Orange, and Silver Line trains. Those lines are currently experiencing 20 to 30 minute delays.
Stessel says that as soon as crews “remove the offending insulator,” they’ll run a test train and restore full service, which should “dissipate the delays quickly.”
An “electrical arcing event” was what had caused Monday’s fatal smoke incident at the L’Enfant Plaza station. National Transportation Safety Board investigators are still looking into what exactly caused the event.
