y. costa yuchenko. brian m. law.

nicholas c. lee. timothy d. mitchell.

danny p. oliver.

roberto c. sanchez. tom a. smith jr.

colorado -- david m. baldwin.

florida -- robert g. german. michael lee horn.

charles r. condeck jr.

mark h. lawson. [crying] jonathan s. pine.

chelsea renee richards. christopher l. smith.

georgia -- n. l. hawk. kevin d. jordan.

michael a. noris.

stephen l. thomas.

[sirens] [background noise] illinois -- james p. morsby.

indiana -- jacob d. calvin. perry w. wren.

nicholas e. schultz. jeffrey b. westerfield.

iowa -- howard j. snyder.

kansas -- jason e. harwood. kentucky -- bob w. branham.

louisiana -- alan m. berez jr. james e. foster jr.

carlos papillon jr.

maryland -- jamal l. clagget.

massachusetts -- greg t. maloney.

dennis o. simmons. michigan -- chad a. charles.

grant william whitaker. minnesota -- scott t. patrick.

mississippi -- john thomas kolum.

john r. street. missouri -- matthew scott chisholm.

eddie j. johnson sr. montana -- joseph j. dunne i.

nebraska -- amanda baker. mark a. hekert.

nevada -- alan r. beck.

igor soldo. new hampshire higher -- -- stephen

joseph arkel. new jersey -- were not sorenaldo arocha, jr. christopher m. goodel.

stephen j. petrozello.

melvin vincent santiago. new mexico -- anthony p. haas.

new york -- frank g. bordenero. thomas k. choy.

dennis e. guerera.

wyn jyn lu. douglas h. mayvell.

darrell r. pearson.

rafael l. ramos. christopher g. skinner.

david w. smith jr. michael c. williams.

north carolina -- jeffrey w. green.

stanley l. klingenschmidt. alexander e. thalman.

ohio -- michael a. paris sr. justin r. weinbrenner.

oklahoma -- bryan d. beck.

kelly a. chase.

terry b. fischer. mitchell d. weeks.

kristen d. willheit. pennsylvania -- richard a. champion.

brian k. dixon ii. david kedra.

cheryl a. pierce. south carolina -- joseph j. madaskovic.

holmes n. smith jr.

tennessee -- david c. johnson. darryl j. perrett.

michael a. petrina. texas -- paul a. buckles.

charles d. dinwiddy. lee dixon.

jessica l. hollis. cleveland d. johnson jr.

mark u. kelley.

alejandro martinez, sr. michael j. naylor.

michael a. pimmintel. jessie valdez, iii.

utah -- corey blake ride.

virginia -- brian m. berger. purcy lee house, iii.

brian w.jones. washington -- derek a. hansen.

wisconsin -- michael j. seversen.

federal -- oswaldo o. albarati-casana. michael c. baskett.

jair j. cabrera. jason m. crisp.

brian j. feldt. alexander i. giannini.

clinton holtz.

brandon k. kountz. mark a. mayo.

frank e. mcknight. ernest j. montoya, sr.

tyler r. robledo

geniel amaro-fantauzzi juaquin correa-ortega.

marielis morales-santiago.

francisco mujica de leon. carlos rivera-vega.

mario torres-martin. acknowledgment of all deceased officers. mrs. amy scully, wife of alvin scully, florence township police department new jersey.

acknowledgment of all disabled officers. deputy sheriff robin hawkins leo county sheriff's office, new mexico.

acknowledgment of all international officers. new south wales police force australia. acknowledgment of law enforcement officers in deleterious service, united states navy. -- military service. united states navy. acknowledgment of all officers tc stats a result of terrorist

action. sergeant craig pollin, pennsylvania state police. acknowledgment of all law officers still serving in law enforcement. the top-performing team of the 2015 honor guard competition. united states border patrol

honor guard. [applause]

>> please stand national chaplain phillip wiggins delivers the closing benediction. >> please join me in prayer. hear our prayer, god, at 10 to our prayer. from the end of the year if i will cry to you. when my heart is overwhelmed lead me to what is higher than i am. you have been a shelter for me a strong power from enemy. i will abide in your tabernacle forever. i will trust in the shelter of your wings. father, lifted the family members and asked if they find rest in you alone. the salvation comes from you. he alone is iraq and our salvation and fortress. we will never be shaken when we place our trust in you. in your name we pray, amen.

>> david gray to sing god bless america.

god bless america, this land i want to see those blue ribbons up there, people. let us remember our fallen.

god bless america, this land that i love. stand beside her and guide her through the night with the light from above. from the mountains, through the prairies, through the ocean god bless america, my home sweet home.

god bless america, we will stand behind her if you will guide her, through the night with the light from above. from the mountain to the prairie, to the ocean white with song. god bless america, my home sweet home. my home sweet home.

>> thank you. [applause] >> colors, detail.

>> colors, detail, present. >> colors, and detail, order.

>> colors, and detail, order.

>> order.

at ease.

>> on behalf of the united states fraternal police artillery, our 322,000 members nationwide, we thank you. we honor the families that are here today with a promise that we will never let america forget your loss. thank you. god bless you. and that concludes the national peace officers memorial service. thank you.

>> next, a news conference on the amtrak derailment. then in other trams to hear president obama speaking at the peace officer memorial -- another chance to hear president obama speaking at the peace officer memorial. >> on the next "washington journal," neema and stephen bradberry will discuss the effectiveness of the patriot act. and then amy harder discusses the decision to allow drilling off of the arctic coast. you can join the conversation on facebook and twitter. "washington journal," live on c-span. >> here are some of the featured

programs for this weekend on c-span networks. saturday morning starting at 10:00 eastern we are at the internet and television expo. speakers include brian roberts kara and fcc chairman wheeler. president obama is at georgetown university, discussing ideas about alleviating poverty in the united states. on c-span two own book tv, we are live at city hall in maryland for the book festival with prize-winning author david and former obama adviser david axelrod. sunday evening at 9:00, the president of the american constitution society on the impact of labor laws on women and their families. and on c-span3, saturday

afternoon at 2:00, remembering the liberation of concentration camps within interview with gerda klein on liberation and the death march she barely survived. on sunday, the relationships that winston churchill developed with americans during his political career. get the complete schedule at c-span.org. >> investigators with the national transportation safety board interviewed the engineer who was operating the amtrak train. the briefing is about 30 minutes. >> hello, and good afternoon. i am a board member with the ntsb and i realize we are later

than we said we would be. the reason for that is around 4:30 we started getting news about interviews that we thought were important for you to know about. we delayed it so we could report that information to you. we've interviewed three crew members today and i want to point out, i'm going to recapture some of the things that they have said, but i want to point out that these crew members have been traumatized through this accident that they were in. and they've not fully recovered from their injuries. we did interview the engineer today. it's been widely reported he's 32 years old. he had his f.r.a., federal railroad administration, required physical just last month. our investigators found the

engineer to be extremely cooperative. he was accompanied by his lawyer which is not at all unusual. and the engineer told us to contact him if we needed anything else. so again we found him to be extremely cooperative. he recalls ringing the train bell as he went through the north philadelphia station that's not a normal station stop for him, but he's required by regulation to sound his bell. may have said horn. he's required to sound his bell as he goes through -- past the station stop. and he did that. he recalled doing that. but he has no recollection of anything past that. he felt fully qualified and comfortable with his equipment and he reported no problems with his train handling.

and when asked, when asked, he demonstrated a very good knowledge, very good working knowledge of the territory. speed limitations, things like that. he began his railroad career while he was in college as a brakeman. he started with amtrak in 2006 as a conductor. and in 2010 he became a locomotive engineer. since 2012 he's worked out of new york city and he's been on this particular job for several weeks. he works five days a week, it's an out and back trip for him. new york, washington and back to new york. five days a week. he said that he did not feel fatigued nor did he report any illness. as we reported the other day

the train has three conductors. the conductor is not able to be interviewed as he is still in the hospital. however we did interview the two assistant conductors. assistant conductor number one is 39 years old. she was hired by amtrak in 2011 and she was in the fourth car, which is the cafe car. she stated that before departing washington, the entire crew conducted a safety briefing where they went over all of the speed restrictions along their intended route.

she reported that it was a normal run through philadelphia, everything was normal up through philadelphia. and she said she could hear the transmission of the locomotive engineer, as conductors carry radios and they're frequently talking to and listening to the locomotive engineer. so she could hear the transmissions from the locomotive engineer. she reported that approximately three to four minutes after departing philadelphia she said she heard the engineer talking to a septa engineer. she recalled that the other engineer had reported to the train dispatcher that he had either been hit by a rock or shot at. and that the septa engineer said he had a broken wind shield and he placed his train into emergency stop. she also believed she heard the engineer say something about -- she also believed that she heard her engineer say something

about his train being struck by something. this is her recollection and certainly we're going to be conducting further investigation of this comment. our investigation has not independently confirmed this information, but we have seen damage to the left-hand lower portion of the amtrak wind shield, that we have asked the f.b.i. to come in and look at for us. we oftentimes rely on the f.b.i. for their technical expertise in such areas and they will be there tonight looking at this particular damage to the amtrak locomotive.

of course when the engine went through the impact, the wind shield was shattered but there's particular damage there that we want them to look at for us. we've secured the track image recorder from the septa train to see what we can learn from that. moving forward, right after she recalled hearing this conversation between the engineer and -- her engineer and septa engineer, she said that she felt a rumbling and her train leaned over and her car went over on its side. she said they were not able to self-evacuate and they waited for the emergency responders to get them out. she said she had about 15 passengers in her car. we asked what her relationship

working relationship was with the -- with her locomotive engineer. she said she had worked with him a good bit and said he was great to work with. she said he was always offering to help her with her job. now let's move to the assistant conductor number two. he's 35 years old, he was hired by amtrak in may of last year, just a few days before the accident, he had celebrated his one-year anniversary with amtrak. he was in the seventh passenger car, that of course is the last passenger car, and he reported having about 40 people in his car. up to the accident he reported no problems other than some radio problems, radio problems with his portable radio. he said that sporadically he could hear, but not sure that some of his transmissions were going out.

at the point that we're describing, at the location of the accident, he said he felt shaking then two major impacts. he said that interior seats disconnected and he attempted to contact the amtrak dispatch center, but does not recall receiving a response. he assisted with the evacuation of engine passengers until he was instructed by emergency responders to go seek medical attention on his own. he said he had not worked much with the amtrak engineer for the accident trip, but he did say he was happy with the engineer and described the engineer as being very professional. so what we've just described is the information that allowed us to delay the press conference so that we could report that

information to you. we've got some other investigative activities that we will fill you in on what's , been going on. we've mentioned through the week a 3-d laser scanner. we've done a 3-d laser scanning of the locomotive interior and exterior. we've scanned a passenger car so we can compare the -- that to the damaged cars. and we've also documented interior safety features in all cars. we've continued the testing of the signals and the signals circuitry. basically as the tracks are being rebuilt, our signals go along to check the continuity of the circuitry. over the weekend we plan to reassemble the train set as much

as we can, to put it back together, connect the brake lines and conduct a brake test and that will take several days. over the course of the last few days, some of you have asked what would we do if we could not talk to the engineer? and how would we resolve it? one of the things we've called for in the wake of a failed train crash in 2008, where 25 people were killed, including the engineer, the ntsb issued recommendations for forward facing image records and inward facing image records, so something that would get a video image, video and audio image of what's going on inside the locomotive cab, as well as the outward facing cameras. - of course this train did have an outward facing camera. we also feel it's important to have the inward facing cameras.

that issue -- that recommendation was issued in 2010 when we completed our investigation of that accident in california. and the f.r.a. has said that they do intend to act upon that recommendation. there's a lot to be done. i think over the last few days we've gotten a lot done. but this will be our final press briefing on scene. future information on this accident will be coming from our press office in washington, d.c. in just a moment i'll ask peter to explain that process. but basically i think you can follow us on our web page, www.ntsb.gov. and also follow us at twitter. i think you know our twitter handle is @ntsb.

i want to emphasize that even though this is the final press briefing, certainly there is a lot of work that needs to be done and will be done over the next several days while our investigative team is here in philadelphia. there's a lot that needs to be done and will be done. but anyway, that's the end of my prepared remarks. if you would please raise your hand, i'll call on you and identify your outlet. questioner: you said the route is from new york to washington and then back to new york? was he coming back? that was his second journey of the day? robert: he does. that was his -- the answer is, it's one round trip. so he starts in the early afternoon, new york, washington, back to new york. so it's one round trip. questioner: how much time is between that? robert: how much time is between that, we will have his schedule. i don't have it immediately in

front of me. we are here to get information that will go away with the passage of time. his schedule we can get next week. but we want to do things like train interviews and things like that, crew interviews. yes, sir. questioner: what else can explain the acceleration of the train? robert: the train does not have -- i flew airplanes for a long time. we had airplanes that had automatic throttles, trains do not have automatic throttles. it's a manual input. we're going to be through the event recorder, through the black box, if will you, we do -- one of the parameters recorded is throttle movement. we'll be looking at that to see if that might correspond with the speed increase. we're also looking for any kind

of mechanical anomaly that could cause the train to excel or a without input. questioner: [inaudible] -- you have been able to get any of his toxicology reports back, blood work things like that? , are there any other video sources of the train that may show you what he was doing before the crash? robert: have we been able to get the tox reports and is there any other video that we may be able to learn from? let me address the video issue first. we're always surprised and happy that there are video sources that come from unintended sources like has been reported on the media. there was a security camera that reported some sparking or really an explosion as it was described on tv that probably came as a result of lines collapsing after the collision , after the accident. so people have cell phone cameras and things like that. so we're always looking for additional sources of video information, if anybody has video information that we don't

know about. we'd love to hear about it from our witness line. that witness line is witness@ntsb.gov. we'd love to hear from that. also the first part of the question was tox results. let me say first of all, i hear people talking about blood work. we do not, the ntsb, does not request blood work. we don't do that. but by federal law, whenever there's a transportation accident involving commercial entities, by federal law safety sensitive transportation workers are required to perform drug and alcohol testing. that is done by the carrier. in this case, by amtrak. so amtrak has conducted that in accordance with the regulations. at least that's the information we have at this time.

that information is set. we take a split sample, amtrak sends that to their independent lab, we send it to our independent lab in oklahoma city. and one of the f.a.a. -- i'm sorry, the d.o.t. requirement is for five specific drugs to be checked for. we send it to the f.a.a. in oklahoma city to look for many many drugs. over-the-counter drugs. it is a long answer to say that that process takes time, but the process has been initiated. there's a question right here. questioner: based on what you saw at the scene and the interviews you've gotten so far today, what is the preliminary conclusion you can draw in terms of what caused this crash? you say you want to look at a particular part of the window. what are you looking for? what did you see that raised suspicion? robert: a couple questions

there. what conclusions can we draw? the answer to that is easy. we do not draw conclusions at this stage of an accident investigation. we're here to collect information. we will draw conclusions at the completion of the investigation which will be after a very thorough and comprehensive investigation. regarding the question about what damage patterns to that windshield are we having the , f.b.i. look at, it would be on the -- if you're standing in the middle of the locomotive cab the centerline, over here's where the engineer's windshield is. over here is the other wind shield. in the lower portion of the left-hand wind shield, there is a circular pattern that emanates out just a bit. so that's the damage to that. questioner: a rock might have gone through that? robert: what could have caused that? we are going to -- that will be part of the analysis and that's exactly what we're going to look at.

questioner: since the ntsb requires similar compliance of truck drivers with hours behind the wheel, does that -- robert: does the ntsb questioner: [inaudible] -- number of hours. robert: what hours of service requirements are there for modes of transportation? those are not regulated by the ntsb. those are regulated by the u.s. department of transportation and they are different depending on whether you're a trucker or a commercial bus driver or an airline pilot or whether you are a train operator. they're very complex. to sit here and explain it right now, i'd have to spend a lot of time looking through regulations. but they are different according to each mode of transportation. questioner: the engineer's injuries and this interview, did anything indicate that the

damage to the windshield was a rock? robert: does the engineer indicate from his injuries that there may have been -- that he may have been struck by something entering the cab? he did not report anything to that effect when he interviewed -- when we interviewed him this afternoon. questioner: [inaudible] robert: did it come from the assistant -- i'm sorry, did the engineer report anything about that conversation about the projectile or being shot at? was he specifically asked that question? he was specifically asked that question and he did not recall -- he did not recall anything of that sort. but there again he does not -- he reported that he does not

have any recollection of anything past north philadelphia. can we kill those fans? can you figure out how to work that thing over there? thank you. good job. almost good job. [laughter] thank you. questioner: i know you said you don't have the schedule right now. do you know if these two routes were the only ones for the day prior to the new york-washington had he done any other trips? , robert: had he done any other trips of that day? no, he had not. he reported for duty in new york, took his train to washington and then he was on his return trip to new york. questioner: the second question, you said you got the track image recorder. robert: do we have any information from the track image recorder, the video recorder from the septa train? we have just secured that and have not looked at that -- have

not evaluated that yet. questioner: did he report having any problems on the way down with the train? robert: did he report having any troubles on the train going down? he operated a different train going down and also he reported no fatigue throughout the day or any illness throughout the day. questioner: and no problems on the way down? >> he had some technical problems on the train going down that got in about 30 minutes late. robert: thanks. just for the microphone purposes, he did apparently have some technical problems on the route down to washington. questioner: follow-up, it's not reporting fatigue, did he report that that was stressful that he was frazzled in any way from that experience? robert: i have no knowledge of him being frazzled as a result of being on time -- or being a little late.

questioner: [inaudible] -- is there any evidence of video image on the train to show any projectile? have you seen anything like that? when the conductor said she overheard the engineer saying that someone may have thrown something at his train, does she believe -- in that context, does she believe it was at that moment or prior to that? robert: does the track image recorder from the amtrak train reveal anything about anything being thrown at the train? and when we evaluated it yesterday, we did not see anything. we will of course -- we're very interested in this report. we want to learn more about it. so we will use all sources of information that we can to independently validate that. the second part of your question, which i've already forgotten was exactly what?

, questioner: -- reported recalling her engineer saying that something might have struck his window as well. was it your understanding that she meant at that moment that they were speaking it happened or it may have happened prior to that? robert: the sort of time frame of things that she's recalling, believing that she heard the septa engineer reporting to the amtrak dispatcher that he had had a broken wind shield and thought that something had either been thrown at his train or being shot at, and then at that time, according to her recollection, the amtrak engineer stated that he had had something along the same lines. questioner: at this point do you have any other corroborating evidence about what may have been a projectile going through the wind shield? robert: at this point do we have any information to corroborate anything shooting at either of the trains? at this time we don't other than the fact that we're having the f.b.i. go out and examine this

fracture pattern in the wind shield. this was late breaking news for us. again, that's why we delayed the press conference. we just interviewed these people this afternoon. it's new information for us and so we will use all available sources to independently corroborate that. let's see. somebody we haven't called on. "wall street journal." questioner: two questions. do you guys know yet whether or not the engineer was manually increasing the speed using the throttle? did the train's alert system work? did the brakes kick in automatically? robert: the question is, and i actually answered the first question about do we know if the train was -- the throttle was being moved -- was being

advanced manually. i've already answered that question. the other part of the question is that, did the train stop on its own or did it stop because the alerter had not, you know in a train if an engineer does not make a movement, throttle movement, horn movement, bell movement, anything like that, if a throttle -- if an engineer does not make an input to the train within a certain period of time, and that period of time varies, varies on the speed, varies with the carrier, varies on a number of things, if the train does not receive an input will sound an alert. if the engineer does not respond, the train will come to a stop. what we said on the first day we got here was the train was placed into engineer-induced braking. which means that the engineer placed the train into emergency braking. that was an engineer.