NTSB: 2nd data recorder found in derailed NY train

NEW YORK — Two data recorders retrieved from the commuter train that derailed while rounding a riverside curve, killing four people and injuring dozens, may provide information on the speed of the train, how the brakes were applied and the throttle setting, a member of the National Transportation Safety Board said Monday.

The NTSB was downloading data from a recorder previously found in the rear locomotive in the train that derailed Sunday in New York. A second recorder was found in the front car of the train and has been sent to Washington for analysis, board member Earl Weener said.

Weener said investigators have already had some success in retrieving data, but the information has to be validated before it's made public. Investigators plan to conduct interviews Monday or Tuesday with the engineer and conductor, Weener said. He also said clues could be found from a signaling system operated by dispatchers at a central location.

The engineer was identified as William Rockefeller, according to two officials familiar with investigation who spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because they weren't authorized to speak publicly.

Workers were using giant cranes to right the toppled rail cars and clear the wreckage Monday morning. Five passenger cars and the locomotive were back on the tracks by around 9:30 a.m.

Officials warned the 26,000 weekday riders on the affected line of the nation's second-biggest commuter railroad to brace for crowded trains; shuttle buses were being provided. However, Metro-North Railroad spokesman Aaron Donovan said no major delays were reported during the early part of the rush hour.

"We'd like to get service up toward the end of the week," Gov. Andrew Cuomo said.

About 150 people were on board when the train derailed Sunday morning on Metro-North's Hudson line. About 60 were injured. Mayor Michael Bloomberg said 11 patients initially in critical condition did not appear to have life-threatening injuries.

The NTSB said its investigators could spend up to 10 days probing all aspects of the accident that toppled seven cars and the locomotive at a bend in the Bronx where the Hudson and Harlem rivers meet. The speed limit on the curve is 30 mph, compared with 70 mph in the area approaching it, Weener said.

The agency said it would consider whether excessive speed, mechanical problems or human error played a role in the crash.

Cuomo said on NBC's "Today" show that he thinks speed will turn out to be a factor. The governor, speaking from the crash site for a second day, said other possible factors ranged from equipment failure and operator failure to a track problem.

"It was actually much worse than it looked," Cuomo said.

"As the cars were skidding across the ground, they were actually picking up a lot of debris, a lot of dirt and stones and tree limbs were going through the cars so it actually looked worse up close," he said, calling it "your worst nightmare."

It was the latest mishap in a troubled year for Metro-North, which had never before experienced a passenger death during an accident in its 31-year history.

As deadly as the derailment was, the toll could have been far greater had it happened on a weekday, or had the lead car plunged into the water instead of nearing it. The train was about half-full at the time of the crash, rail officials said.

Joel Zaritsky, who was dozing as he traveled to a dental convention, awoke to feel his car overturning several times.

"Then I saw the gravel coming at me, and I heard people screaming," he said, holding his bloody right hand. "There was smoke everywhere and debris. People were thrown to the other side of the train."

One passenger, Frank Tatulli, told WABC-TV that the train appeared to be going "a lot faster" than usual as it approached the sharp curve near the Spuyten Duyvil station.

Nearby residents awoke to a building-shaking boom. Angel Gonzalez was in bed in his high-rise apartment overlooking the rail curve when he heard the roar.

"I thought it was a plane that crashed," he said.

Within minutes, dozens of emergency crews arrived and carried passengers away on stretchers, some wearing neck braces. Others, bloodied and scratched, held ice packs to their heads. In their efforts to find passengers, rescuers shattered windows, searched nearby woods and waters and used pneumatic jacks and air bags to peer under wreckage.

The Metropolitan Transportation Authority, which runs Metro-North, identified the victims as Donna L. Smith, 54, of Newburgh; James G. Lovell, 58, of Cold Spring; James M. Ferrari, 59, of Montrose; and Ahn Kisook, 35, of Queens. Three of the dead were found outside the train; one was inside. Autopsies were scheduled for Monday.

Lovell, an audio technician, was traveling to midtown Manhattan to work on the famed Rockefeller Center Christmas tree, longtime friend Janet Barton said. The tree-lighting ceremony is Wednesday night.

The "Today" show expressed condolences to the family of Lovell, a married father of four who had worked on the program and other NBC shows. "He always had a smile on his face and was quick to share a friendly greeting," ''Today" executive producer Don Nash said in a message to staff.

Though the cause of the crash is not yet known, the NTSB has been urging railroads for decades to install technology that can stop derailing caused by excessive speed, along with other problems.

A rail-safety law passed by Congress in 2008 gave commuter and freight railroads until the end of 2015 to install the systems, known as positive train control. PTC is aimed at preventing human error — the cause of about 40 percent of train accidents. But the systems are expensive and complicated. Railroads are trying to push back the installation deadline another five to seven years.

Metro-North is in the process of installing the technology. It now has what's called an "automatic train control" signal system, which automatically applies the brakes if an engineer fails to respond to an alert that indicates excessive speed.

Such systems can slow trains in some circumstances but not bring them to a halt, said Grady Cothen, a former Federal Railroad Administration safety official.

Sunday's accident came six months after an eastbound train derailed in Bridgeport, Conn., and was struck by a westbound train. The crash injured 73 passengers, two engineers and a conductor. In July, a freight train full of garbage derailed on the same Metro-North line near the site of Sunday's wreckage.

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Associated Press writers Kiley Armstrong, Verena Dobnik, Deepti Hajela, Ula Ilnytzky, Colleen Long, Jake Pearson and Jennifer Peltz in New York, Joan Lowy in Washington and Stephen Singer in Hartford, Conn., contributed to this report.

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Saab is back: First cars produced under new owners

STOCKHOLM — Two and a half years after Saab shut down production due to financial trouble, the Swedish car rolled a new sedan off its assembly lines in Trollhattan, in south-west Sweden, on Monday.

National Electric Vehicle Sweden, the Hong Kong-based company that bought the brand out of bankruptcy in September last year, presented its new 9-3 Aero Sedan as the first in a series of new cars it will produce.

The company, also called NEVS, said the first 200 cars will be delivered in the spring and will cost 279,000 kronor ($42,500) each. Next year, it will also launch a 9-3 wagon, followed by convertible and electric models.

Saab shut down production in April 2011 after six decades of building cars as its earlier Dutch owner, Spyker Cars, struggled with financing. It filed for bankruptcy in December the same year, dealing a huge blow to the town of Trollhattan and the company's 3,000 employees.

NEVS now employs around 600 people, including many former Saab employees, and acting President Mattias Bergman said he felt "incredibly happy, proud and humble" that the company has been able to restart production.

Bergman wouldn't give any forecast of how many cars NEVS expects to sell but said they will start on a small scale and adjust production based on order intake.

The company aims to make electric cars under the Saab brand, but said it will also provide gasoline-fuelled cars until "electric cars fully meet customer demands." It said it decided to start off with a gasoline-fuelled car to get production going as fast as possible and retain previous supply chains and specialist staff.

It said it will start selling its cars directly to Swedish customers through its website as of Dec. 10.

The luxury sports car maker Spyker Cars bought Saab from General Motors — itself in bankruptcy protection following the financial crisis — in 2010. At that time, Saab sales had dwindled to around 27,000 from a peak of around 133,000 cars in 2006.

GM had acquired a 50 percent stake of Saab in 1989, and gained full ownership in 2000.

The aircraft and defense company with the same name is an independent entity, building fighter jets and weapons systems.

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Follow Malin Rising on Twitter at: https://twitter.com/malinrising

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US construction spending up 0.8 percent in October

WASHINGTON — U.S. developers boosted construction spending in October at the fastest pace in more than four years, propelled by a surge in government projects. But spending on home construction and commercial projects both fell.

Overall construction spending increased 0.8 percent in October to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $908.4 billion, the Labor Department said Monday. That's up from September, when spending fell 0.3 percent.

The October pace was the best since May 2009 and was driven by a 3.9 percent surge in public spending. Federal spending increased 10.9 percent, suggesting the 16-day partial government shutdown had little impact on public projects.

Spending on state and local government construction also rose.

One troubling sign: Home construction fell 0.6 percent in October from September, dragged lower by a drop in single-family homes.

But spending on home construction has surged 17.8 percent in the past 12 months, the fastest year-over-year pace since the peak of the 2008 financial crisis. And a recent jump in permits to build apartments indicates that will continue.

Deutsche Bank chief U.S. economist Joseph Lavorgna said that spending on single-family houses should rebound given plans by homebuilders to ramp up construction.

"The recent dip should reverse course given the ongoing improvement in permits for new construction," Lavorgna said in a client note.

Nonresidential spending fell 0.5 percent in October from September, lowered by declines in the building of private power plants, communication facilities and amusement parks and recreation centers. Construction of office buildings, hotels and private schools all increased.

The decline in home construction in October may prove temporary. Permits issued to build apartments increased in October at their fastest pace in more than five years. But permits for single-family home construction rose only slightly and were at the same pace as in May.

Single-family houses make up roughly two-thirds of the residential construction market. The pace of homebuilding has rebounded from the depths of the recession. But sales of new single-family homes have grown more slowly, and higher mortgage rates could slow them further.

Both the October and September figures were released Monday, after reporting was delayed due to shutdown in October. The government also said spending in August and July were less than initially reported.

Mortgage rates are nearly a full percentage point higher than the spring. Rates rose in May when the Federal Reserve first signaled that it might slow its $85 billion in monthly bond purchases. But rates have moderated from recent highs after the Fed decided to keep its bond buying intact.

The average rate on a 30-year fixed mortgage was 4.29 percent, which is still close to historic lows.

Though new homes represent only a fraction of the housing market, they have an outsize impact on the economy. Each home built creates an average of three jobs for a year and generates about $90,000 in tax revenue, according to National Association of Home Builders.

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Madoff's right-hand man takes stand in NYC trial

NEW YORK — The way Frank DiPascali tells it, Bernard Madoff planted the seeds of deception for his $17 billion Ponzi scheme back in the 1970s, when his firm was in a small office at 110 Wall Street.

Madoff "would very loudly proclaim" that he had made a killing on an investment in Europe, DiPascali recalled. DiPascali, a longtime Madoff employee, later began to suspect the words were calculated to give the impression the business was "somehow backed up by his deals and investments overseas."

Whether Madoff's inner circle actually believed that lie has become central to a trial in federal court in Manhattan in which DiPascali is the government's star witness.

DiPascali, who started working for Madoff in the mid-1970s, took the stand Monday. He began his testimony, which is expected to last for days, by discussing how business was done then.

Part of his behind-the-scenes account was previewed last year in sections of FBI reports that were turned over to the defense. The reports, based on initial interviews of DiPascali, at times appear to support the contention that the defendants were unwitting dupes led astray by a devious boss.

But the reports also suggest the five had doubts about Madoff and his investment wizardry. DiPascali says two became convinced it was all a scam — and even confronted Madoff about it — but ultimately did nothing to stop it.

Defense attorneys have already attacked DiPascali's credibility, calling him equal partners in crime with Madoff.

"The evidence will show DiPascali is a pathological liar, and the government's case relies on you believing DiPascali," Andrew Frisch said in opening statements. "And now instead of Madoff, DiPascali's bosses are the government lawyers at this table."

His testimony represents a turnabout for DiPascali, who kept Madoff's secrets for decades until he agreed to cooperate with the FBI in early 2009 following Madoff's arrest in 2008.

Madoff, 75, admitted that accounts he had told investors were worth nearly $68 billion only days earlier actually held only a few hundred million dollars. He pleaded guilty to fraud charges a few months later and was sentenced to a 150-year prison term in Butner, N.C.

DiPascali, 57, who is out on bail but facing substantial prison time, carries his own baggage as the beneficiary of a bank account filled with investors' money that amounted to a slush fund for Madoff's family and top employees. Authorities say he withdrew more than $5 million from the account between 2002 and 2008 to fund personal expenses, including the purchase of a new boat.

In a guilty plea in 2009, DiPascali described himself as unsophisticated "kid from Queens" who began working for Madoff in 1975 and stayed until the bitter end.

"I was loyal to him," DiPascali said. "I ended up being loyal to a terrible, terrible fault."

In the late 1980s and early 1990s, DiPascali said he realized investments that Madoff was making for thousands of clients were fake. But he claimed he, like others, believed Madoff had other assets that would cover claims by investors who wanted their money back.

Prosecutors have accused Madoff's secretary, Annette Bongiorno, and JoAnn Crupi, an account manager, of using old stock tables to fabricate account statements so they would show steady returns even during economic downturns. They say Daniel Bonventre, his director for operations, cooked the books to throw off regulators.

According to the FBI reports, when Bongiorno first began working at the firm, DiPascali heard Madoff feed her his cover story "about deals he had going on Europe." He believed Crupi had likewise "convinced herself over the years that Madoff had a vast array of assets all over the world." He also "surmised that Madoff was probably telling Bonventre the same lies" as the others.

While others kept quiet, the remaining defendants — computer programmers Jerome O'Hara and George Perez — grew increasingly restless during the mid-2000s after they were tasked with maintaining programs that helped conceal the fraud, DiPascali told the FBI. During a boozy dinner at a Greek restaurant in Manhattan, the pair asked him whether Madoff's business was legitimate — a suggestion he laughed off but privately wondered why it took them so long to ask, the reports say.

DiPascali told the FBI that O'Hara and Perez finally demanded a meeting with Madoff. With DiPascali listening from a couch in Madoff's office, they told their boss that his business was illegal and that he should shut it down.

Madoff at first listened politely, reminding the men that he had been a successful investor for 40 years and that they didn't understand he was making his money overseas. Then, according to DiPascali, he blew up.

"You are not going to tell me how to run my business," Madoff said.

Prosecutors allege that at a later closed-door meeting, O'Hara and Perez demanded — and received — hush money. Another Madoff secretary has told investigators, "Jerry and George looked smug when they came out."

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Oil rises on China's modest manufacturing growth

The price of oil drifted up to around $93 a barrel as China's manufacturing growth held steady at a modest pace in November.

By early afternoon in Europe, benchmark U.S. crude for January delivery was up 36 cents at $93.08 a barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. The contract fell 41 cents to close at $93.68 on Friday.

Chinese manufacturing continued to grow slightly in November, a survey showed, in evidence that growth in the world's No. 2 economy was continuing, albeit at a modest pace.

HSBC's purchasing managers' index released Monday slipped to 50.8 points from 50.9 in October. Although November's reading was little changed, HSBC said it was the second-highest level in eight months, indicating China's massive manufacturing industries are improving, though marginally.

China's leaders are counting on a continuing recovery to avoid the need for further stimulus. China's economic growth rose to 7.8 percent in the third quarter after slumping to a two-decade low of 7.5 percent in the previous three months.

"The bullish (Chinese) data, combined with the expectation that OPEC will leave its oil production quota unchanged at 30 million barrels per day ... has supported the U.S. benchmark," said a report from Sucden Financial Research in London.

Delegates from some of the world's key oil producers, including Saudi Arabia, Venezuela and Nigeria, will meet Wednesday at OPEC headquarters in Vienna.

An estimate from analysts at JBC Energy in Vienna showed OPEC's crude output fell to 29.44 million barrels a day in November, the lowest since May 2011 and the third straight month with output below 30 million. Most of the difference was attributed to production and export snags in Libya, where political volatility and the effects of the 2011 civil war continue to affect the oil industry.

Meanwhile, Brent crude, a benchmark for international oils, was down 35 cents to $109.34 a barrel on the ICE Futures exchange in London.

In other energy futures trading on Nymex:

— Wholesale gasoline lost 0.5 cent to $2.6623 a gallon.

— Heating oil fell 0.63 cents to $3.0245 a gallon.

— Natural gas shed 3 cents to $3.924 per 1,000 cubic feet.

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Scalloping season kicks off in Maine

PORTLAND, Maine — Maine scallop fishermen are kicking off a season that'll last 70 days along most of the coast.

But fishermen in the scallop-rich waters of Cobscook Bay along the Canadian border in far eastern Maine will be limited to a 50-day season. The season opened Monday in three zones from Kittery to Lubec.

Maine's scallop fishermen operate under a regulatory system that divides the state into three zones with restrictions and closures in a number of areas aimed at allowing scallops to replenish.

Marine Resources Commissioner Patrick Keliher says the restrictions have been challenging but they're working. Fishermen last year hauled in 2.4 million pounds, the best harvest in a decade. The catch was worth $3.2 million

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Amazon.com sees delivery drones as future

NEW YORK — Amazon.com is working on a way to get packages to customers in 30 minutes or less — by drone.

Consider it the modern version of a pizza delivery boy, minus the boy.

Amazon.com said it's working on the so-called Prime Air unmanned aircraft project in its research and development labs. But the company says it will take years to advance the technology and for the Federal Aviation Administration to create the necessary rules and regulations.

The project was first reported Sunday by CBS' "60 Minutes."

Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos said in a primetime interview that while the octocopters look like something out of science fiction, there's no reason they can't be used as delivery vehicles.

Bezos said the drones can carry packages that weigh up to five pounds, which covers about 86 percent of the items Amazon delivers. The current generation of drones the company is testing has a range of about 10 miles, which Bezos noted could cover a significant portion of the population in urban areas.

While it's tough to say exactly how long it could take the project to get off the ground, Bezos told "60 Minutes" that he thinks it could happen in four or five years.

One of the biggest promises for civilian drone use has been in agriculture.

The unmanned aircraft can fly over large fields and search out bugs, rodents and other animals that might harm crops. Then, thanks to GPS, another drone could come back and spread pesticide on that small quadrant of the field.

Agriculture is also seen as the most-promising use because of the industry's largely unpopulated, wide open spaces. Delivering Amazon packages in midtown Manhattan will be much trickier.

Besides regulatory approval, Amazon's biggest challenge will be to develop a collision avoidance system, said Darryl Jenkins, a consultant who has given up on the commercial airline industry and now focuses on drones.

Who is to blame, Jenkins asked, if the drone hits a bird, crashes into a building? Who is going to insure the deliveries?

There are also technical questions. Who will recharge the drone batteries? How many deliveries can the machines make before needing service?

"Jeff Bezos might be the single person in the universe who could make something like this happen," Jenkins said. "For what it worth, this is a guy who's totally changed retailing."

The biggest losers could be package delivery services like the U.S. Postal Service, FedEx and UPS.

FedEx spokesman Jess Bunn said in an email: "While we can't speculate about this particular technology, I can say that making every customer experience outstanding is our priority, and anything we do from a technology standpoint will be with that in mind."

Amazon's stock dipped $1.98, or less than one percent, to $391.64 in Monday morning's trading.

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With reports from David Koenig in Dallas.

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Scott Mayerowitz can be reached at http://twitter.com/GlobeTrotScott.

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Mass. gas prices up another 3 cents per gallon

BOSTON — The cost of a gallon gas in Massachusetts is up another 3 cents, and has now jumped 8 cents in the past month.

AAA Southern New England reports Monday that the average price of a gallon of self-serve regular is up to $3.38 in the past week.

That's 11 cents higher than the national average for the same grade, but still 16 cents lower than the in-state price at the same time a year ago.

AAA found self-serve regular selling as low as $3.28 per gallon and as high as $3.59 per gallon.

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US manufacturing grows at fastest in 2½ years

WASHINGTON — U.S. manufacturing grew in November at the fastest pace in 2½ years as factories ramped up production, stepped up hiring and received orders at a healthy clip.

The Institute for Supply Management said Monday that its index of manufacturing activity rose to 57.3. That was up from 56.4 in October and was the highest since April 2011. A reading above 50 signals growth.

One component of the index, a measure of hiring, rose to its highest level in nearly 18 months. And a gauge of export orders reached its highest level in nearly two years. Overseas demand is benefiting from modest recoveries in Europe, Japan and China.

The ISM is a trade group of purchasing managers.

Manufacturing activity has now expanded for six straight months after hitting a rough patch in the spring. The steady gains suggest that growth is remaining solid in the current October-December quarter.

And U.S. builders increased construction spending in October at the fastest pace in more than four years, a separate report on Monday showed. Government spending on public projects drove the increase. By contrast, spending on home construction fell.

Still, the encouraging figures in the ISM's report conflict with weaker recent data on factory activity, making it difficult to discern a clear trend.

"We continue to believe that this indicator is overstating the health of the broader economy," said Joshua Shapiro, chief U.S. economist at MFR Inc.

For example, businesses cut back on orders for long-lasting factory goods in October, according to a government report Wednesday. Orders for durable goods, which are meant to last three years, fell 2 percent.

A fall in aircraft demand drove the decline. But companies also spent less on machinery, computers and metal parts. The weak showing suggests that businesses might have been reluctant to order more goods during the 16-day partial government shutdown in October.

One reason for the divergence could be that the ISM's index doesn't adequately measure smaller manufacturers, according to Ian Shepherdson, an economist at Pantheon Macroeconomics. Larger companies are likely benefiting more from recoveries overseas.

Separate reports Monday showed that manufacturers in China and Europe expanded in November, though more slowly than in the United States. Still, factories in Europe grew at the fastest pace in nearly two years, according to a survey by Markit.

Another reason for the conflicting reports may be that production of non-durable goods appears to be stronger than production of durable goods. For example, the ISM report showed that manufacturing in non-durable areas like the food, textiles, petroleum, chemical and paper products industries grew. At the same time, some durable goods industries, such as machinery, contracted in November.

Some respondents to the ISM's survey said federal spending cuts and budget battles in Washington limited business spending on durable goods last month.

Separately, factory output rose for a third straight month in October, according to the Federal Reserve, driven higher by greater production of primary metals and furniture.

The mixed picture comes as the economy is thought to be slowing in the October-December quarter to an annual rate of 2 percent or less. That would be down from a 2.8 percent annual pace in the July-September quarter.

Much of the third quarter's growth was due to companies rebuilding their stockpiles. The economy is unlikely to benefit from a similar trend in the current quarter.

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Fast-food protests planned for 100 cities

NEW YORK — Fast-food workers in about 100 cities will walk off the job this Thursday, organizers say, which would mark the largest effort yet in a push for higher pay.

The actions are intended to build on a campaign that began about a year ago to call attention to the difficulties of living on the federal minimum wage of $7.25 an hour.

The protests are part of a growing push by labor unions, Democrats and other worker advocacy groups to raise pay in historically low-wage sectors. Last month, President Barack Obama said he would back a Senate measure to raise the federal minimum wage to $10.10. That's more than the $9 an hour he previously proposed.

Protesters are calling for $15 an hour, although many see the figure as a rallying point rather than a near-term possibility.

It's not clear how large the turnout will be at any given location, or whether the walkouts will be enough to disrupt operations. Similar actions this summer had varying results, with some restaurants unable to serve customers and others seemingly unaffected.

The National Restaurant Association, an industry lobbying group, called the demonstrations a "campaign engineered by national labor groups," and said the vast majority of participants were union protesters rather than workers.

The group said that the demonstrations in the past "have fallen well short of their purported numbers."

Kendall Fells, a New York City-based organizer for Fast Food Forward, said demonstrations are also planned for 100 cities, in addition to the 100 cities where workers will strike. He said plans started coming together shortly after the one-day actions in about 60 cities this summer.

"They understand they're not going to win from a one-day strike," Fells said of workers.

Still, organizers face an uphill battle in reshaping an industry that competes aggressively on low prices, a practice that has intensified as companies including McDonald's Corp., Burger King Worldwide Inc. and Yum Brands Inc. face growing competition and slow growth in the weak economy.

Fast-food workers have also been seen as difficult to organize, given the industry's high turnover rates. But the Service Employees International Union, which represents more than 2 million workers in health care, janitorial and other industries, has been providing organizational and financial support to the push for higher pay over the past year.

In the meantime, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., has promised a vote on the wage hike by the end of the year. But the measure is not expected to gain traction in the House, where Republican leaders oppose it.

Supporters of wage hikes have been successful at the state and local level. Last month, voters in New Jersey approved a hike in the minimum to $8.25 an hour, up from $7.25 an hour. California, New York, Connecticut and Rhode Island also raised their minimum wages this year.

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Follow Candice Choi at www.twitter.com/candicechoi

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