FTA Acting Administrator Therese McMillan issued an online letter to the public transportation industry in late July outlining the agency’s new accident investigation role, including how FTA accident investigators operate and interact with State Safety Oversight Agencies (SSOAs) and FTA grantees, a responsibility granted to the agency by MAP-21.

The role of FTA accident investigators is two-fold, McMillan stated: “to investigate safety-related events in the transit ­industry and to gather information that informs the safety process within the FTA. The FTA’s investigators may travel to the scene of an incident, or simply contact the responsible SSOA, the FTA grantee or other involved parties to obtain information,” she said.

She also noted the specific duties of FTA investigators, including “regularly contacting SSOAs, transit providers, manufacturers, trade organizations and other industry stakeholders to collect detailed safety-related data. These communications are part of FTA’s effort to use Safety Management System processes to identify risk across the transit industry. As a result, FTA’s investigators may contact you when there has been an accident or incident, as well as on a regular basis as they seek to partner with you to make a very safe mode of travel even safer.”