Railroader's UFO Collision: CSX?

[wallyworld]

This is from the National UFO Reporting Center Website. Where's Rod Serling when we need him? Can anyone figure out what road this is?

Occurred : 1/14/2002 02:47 (Entered as : 01/14/02 2:47)
Reported: 4/3/2006 11:51:27 AM 11:51
Posted: 5/15/2006
Location: Paintsville, KY
Shape: Disk
Duration:15 minutes
Train Collision

At exactly 2:47 a.m. on Jan. 14 02, while working a coal train enroute from Russell Kentucky to Shelbiana Kentucky, our trailing unit and first two cars were severely damaged as we struck an unknown floating or hovering object. I know it was 2:47 because my watch froze, and to this day shows that time. Along with my watch the entire electrical systems on both locomotives went haywire.

Approaching a bend near milepost cmg 42 in an area referred to as the wild kingdom, for the many different types of animals spotted there, my conductor and I saw lights coming from around the way. This ordinarily means another train is coming and will pass on the other track. The outlay of the area is this, the river, #1 track, #2 track and a straight up mountainside, carved out for the laying of these tracks. I killed our lights as not to blind the oncoming crew.

As we rounded the corner our onboard computer began to flash in and out, speed recorder went nuts, and both locomotives died. Alarm bells began to ring and thats when we saw the objects. Apparently scanning the river for something, the objects, (at least 3) had several "search" lights trained there, the first object hovered about 10 to 12 feet above the track.

Metallic silver in color with multiple colored lights near the bottom and in the middle, no windows or openings of any kind that we could see. Approximately 18 to 20 feet in length and probably ten feet high.

With both engines dead as we rounded the corner we made little noise and the first object did not respond in time, I estimate that we hit the object at 30 mph with 16,000 trailing tons behind us. It clipped the top of our lead unit then skipped back slicing a chunk out of our trailing unit and first two coal cars. The other objects vanished into thin air.

Our emergency brakes had initiated due to the loss of power and we stopped approximately a mile and a half to two miles after impact. Our power restored after we were stopped and we notified our dispatcher, located in Jacksonville Fla. of what had happened.

We were told to inspect the cars to see if they'd hold the rail and try to limp into milepost cmg 60 which used to be the Paintsville yard which is no longer in full operation. We checked everything out and the cab of the rear locomotive was demolished and smoking, the second two cars looked as if they had been hit with a giant hammer but looked like they'd hold the rail.

We pulled into Paintsville yard at approximately 5:15 am. The huge overhead lights lining the yard were noticeably dark and the only lights came from what we assumed were railroad officials vehicles parked near the end of the track. We pulled to a stop and began unloading our grips off the wounded train.

We could hear what sounded like an army of workers immediately tending to our train. Vehicle doors slamming, guys running by in weird outfits and lights glaring from all directions, the one thing missing was railroad officials.

A guy named Ferguson shook my hand and asked me to follow him into the old yard office. We did, once inside they, and by they I mean I have no idea who these people were, began to ask us hundreds of questions, they then told us for our own protection we'd be medically tested before we could leave.

I asked repeatedly to talk to my road foreman or trainmaster and not only were these requests denied but they confiscated my conductors cellular phone.

Hours later we were led outside the old yard office and the strange things continued to happen, the 2 locomotives and two cars were removed from the rest of the train we had brought in and my only guess was parked 4 tracks over under a huge tent like structure buzzing with activity. We were lead off property and told due to national security our silence on this matter would be appreciated.

We were then put in a Railroad vehicle and taken to Martin Kentucky were we went throgh questioning again with railroad officials and were then drug tested.

After all of this we were sent on to Shelbiana, where we took rest for 8 hours and worked another train back to Russell. Working back we passed by Paintsville, no sign of the engines, cars, tent, people, nothing.

[kenneo]

CSX --- dispatcher located in Jacksonville.

So, do we have a Roswell, KY, as well as NM? Wildkingdom is a good name for the place!

[wallyworld]

99% of these I take with a very large dose of skepticism ,along with my curiousity. This one had so many specific details which are nearly always missing-so it stood out.
It seems like it would be pretty easy to verfify the facts-date-time-location -maybe not. Experimental aircraft?

[Anonymous]

[alien]

[cr6479]

Was their a military base nearby?

[Anonymous]

What were the road numbers of the two locomotives? Once you find out that, look up the numbers and see if they are still active, retired, have dissapeared, etc..

[coborn35]

It sounds likely, knowing our government, but you cant just HIDE stuff like locomotives.... can you?

[METRO]

Not that I'm at all trying to feed a consipracy ideology here, I'm forever a skeptic as I learned to be from my great-grandfather who was a military aircraft designer, but if the United States government wanted to get rid of a couple train engines, that wouldn't at all be a big deal. There are millions of acares of government land in America, especially in states like Nevada and Arizona. I doubt the CSX engine roster would list the units as "dissapeared" or MIA or anything though.

There's usually a perfectly reasonable and earthly explanation for most every "UFO" encounter. What this sounds like to me is a set of military UAVs (unmanned aircraft) probably USMC Cypher search drones, They were probably on a training or test mission and accidentally smacked the trains. Somebody probably got hell for that one back at base, those drones are expensive! The Cyphers could have been operating under an electromagnetic countermeasures condition which would explain the weird electronic effects inside the engines. There's nothing out of this world about what happened to that train, it's entirely possible based upon current military technology here in the United States.

Was the train running late? If so that could explain the incident totally as the military didn't think there would be a train at that location at that time.

Cheers!
~METRO

[cr6479]

It looks like area 51 KY.

[bnsfkline]

I heard about this earlier, and if I remember correctly, the units were two GE AC4400CW's, units #234 and 187, with 187 trailing.

[miniwyo]

Nah Noo Nah Noo!!

[coborn35]

Why wouldnt the dispatcher wonder where the train went? And the power folks where the hell there engine went?

[cr6479]

That is a good question that coborn35 has brought up!

[METRO]

QUOTE: Originally posted by bnsfkline

I heard about this earlier, and if I remember correctly, the units were two GE AC4400CW's, units #234 and 187, with 187 trailing.

According to the current CSX roster at http://www.trainweb.org/csxphotos/html/Active1.html unit 234 is in active service and there is no unit 187.

In response to coborn35's question that's a big hole in the story but it's never really covered. The story never says weather or not the railroad is informed of the train's apparent impound by the government. My guess, again working on most reasonable explanation would be that if an electronic warfare system was used in the area, the military would want to gather data on the effects of the weapon upon the engine's computers and electrical system before returning it to CSX. This could be done in the span of just a few hours as well.

Back when I spent some time at the Air Force Accademy, there was a rather famous story of a highway cop in California using a radar gun on a highway near a USAF base. The cop accidentally pointed his radar in the direction of a landing F16C fighter and the pilot in turn activated an electronic jamming system as his plane's computer warned him that he was being painted by the radar. (an F16 Falcon's computer can't tell the difference between a radar gun and the guidance system on a shoulder launched missle) the Cop's gun went nuts and he read as speed of something like 600mpr before going into an error state and fried. I've been told the gun was confiscated and now sits on the pilot's locker as a trophy.

Cheers!
~METRO

[Anonymous]

pics of the ruined loco?

[wallyworld]

One aspect of this supposed event that stood out as a weak link in the story was that after the initial notification of the dispatcher, how quickly a full armada of specialists ( quick reaction team? ) descended on the train, set up in advance of their arrival in Paintsville. This appears to be a pretty remote area. Any military bases close by?

[paulstecyna21]

QUOTE: Originally posted by wallyworld

One aspect of this supposed event that stood out as a weak link in the story was that after the initial notification of the dispatcher, how quickly a full armada of specialists ( quick reaction team? ) descended on the train, set up in advance of their arrival in Paintsville. This appears to be a pretty remote area. Any military bases close by?

do you still remember the engine numbers that you had on the locomotives? I believe metro about the engines but someone would want to contact CSX about thier engines.

[zardoz]

I saw that episode also.


I think it would be quite a significant event in human history if we were contacted by an extraterrestial intelligence. But if the ET's monitor our transmissions (tv & radio) then my guess is that they would either zap us into oblivion to save the rest of the universe from our violence, or they would do do a quick 180 and just leave us the heck alone. I would hope they would contact us in order to try to help us, but I'm not counting on it.


However, the original post would seem to indicate that there are beings that can navigate interstellar space with a technology that we can only imagine, and that they manage to come all the way to earth, and end up hitting a train.

Does this mean that drivers everywhere in the universe are dumb enough to mess with trains with their vehicles?

[chad thomas]

QUOTE: Originally posted by miniwyo

Nah Noo Nah Noo!!

Shozbot !!

[wallyworld]

If it did happen as reported, my personal best guess is a remote guided experimental plane such as used now in the Middle East. More development as a weapons platform is going on. It could have lost telemetry or guidance went amok. Oops.

[vsmith]

If ET was stupid enough to let a light speed capable flying saucer get dinged by a 30mph train, I think the Universe has bigger problems.....

[fuzzybroken]

QUOTE: Originally posted by zardoz

Does this mean that drivers everywhere in the universe are dumb enough to mess with trains with their vehicles?

LOL!!!

Uhh-huh!

[chad thomas]

Mabee our first contact with extraterrestrial beings will be a lawsuit against the railroad because of there UFO getting hit at a grade crossing.

[Anonymous]

I never did believe that [alien] visited us. To try to prove otherwise is a case of [banghead]. If you ask me UFO's are new types of aircraft being given test runs. Just remember the Stealth Bomber. [;)]

[Anonymous]

I agree with zardoz that any aliens seeing what the human race is usually up to would do a 180 degree turn & head for other parts of the universe.

But enough of my [soapbox] lectures.

Where is the X-File's team of Mulder and Scully when you need them[?]

[Hugh Jampton]

QUOTE: Originally posted by chad thomas

Mabee our first contact with extraterrestrial beings will be a lawsuit against the railroad because of there UFO getting hit at a grade crossing.

The alien's do have a good chance of claiming as the engineer admitted that he extingushed the unit's headlights, and did not mention that he sounded the horn, or made any other attempt to warn them of his oncoming train..

[wallyworld]

Railfans from Alpha Centuri?

[Poppa_Zit]

Upon hearing this report, I shall now remove my aluminum foil hat and wait for orders like a good little Art Bell listener. Na-nu-na-nu!

[(-D][(-D][(-D][(-D][(-D][(-D][(-D][(-D][(-D][(-D][(-D][(-D][(-D][(-D][(-D][(-D][(-D][(-D][(-D][(-D][(-D][(-D][(-D][(-D][(-D][(-D][(-D][(-D][(-D][(-D][(-D][(-D][(-D][(-D]

Postscript: wallyworld, where do you find this great stuff?

[carnej1]

I think that this incident could be the start of a massive intergalactic war and to avert it we need to educate all potential extraterrestrial visitors about this danger...We need to construct a huge, worldwide array of radiotelescope sized transmitters and beam Operation Livesaver public service announcements out to the galaxy 24-7.................................there goes the last crumb of Amtrak's funding....................

[Anonymous]

Just in case something happens I just happen to have a great selection of aluminum foil hats on for sale for a very good price. [:D]

But I want first nibs on Gillian Anderson - Scully on X-Files. [:)]