chinatown782411 wrote:As it has been said before, idiots and trains just don't mix.
At the age of 16, a switcher was standing on the C&NW westbound main headed east. The eastbound passenger train was running 2 hours late. Because I thought the wig-wag was for the switcher, I crossed just ahead of the passenger train, not seeing him until he filled my driver side window. I was safe by maybe 1 second. I learned a good lesson that night almost 50 years ago.
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Building the CPR Kootenay division in N scale, blog here: http://kootenaymodelrailway.wordpress.com/
Where I frequently railfan, it's a level crossing and in the last month there has been one car hit and a truck almost hit, now these ones weren't caused by cars racing the gates or light, the first the truck stalled on the crossing and a long freight train was coming and luckily the engineer spotted the truck from about a Km away and stopped in time, but only metres in it! and the second A car turned too early and drove down the track, after about three minutes a city train came and clobbered the car at 70kmph luckily the occupants had cleared out in time. but when I do go down there, I reguarly see vehicles cyclists and pedestrians run the lights, people don't realise that, A red light at a level crossing has the same meaning as a stop light at an intersection! the drivers complain that the gates come down too soon after the lights begin to flash, but I have timed it, and from when the lights start flashing it's about 12 seconds before the gates come down, the speed limit on the road there is 50kmph so that equates to about 600m to see the lights before you get to the crossing. PLENTY of time. and the speed limit for trains is 90 for freights and 110 for passenger and 120 for tilt trains, a car has no chance at those speeds.
I'm heading down tomorrow to get some pics of the crossing and trains, i'll post some tomorrow night.
James, Brisbane Australia
Modelling AT&SF in the 90s
It seems that, regardless of which country we live in, we all seem to have the same breed of "Baffoon" behind the wheel of a motor vehicle. Color, Race nor Creed make no never mind.An Idiot is an Idiot!!!
Years ago I was in the head end of a commuter train on the San Francisco peninsula. We were in an FM Trainmaster doing 80 MPH when we hit a big buick. The woman driving ran around the gates and we could not stop. The knuckle wrapped around the center post and pushed the drivers side half way throught the car. By the time we stopped 3/4 of a mile later the top the car was shredded from being bounced over the tracks and pushed by the train. It was NOT a pretty site. Obviously the driver did not survive. At 350,000 pounds, doing 80 MPH is a lot of energy hitting the car and then more as the car is pushed down the track.
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"...what else could the train do - get off track? "
-Well, the engineer should have wrenched the steering wheel and swerved out of the way. Hey, I just noticed looking at those pics again...for some STRANGE reason...I don't see one of those "I brake for trains" stickers on any of those vehicles. Eh, people are always in a hurry. On the highway here, when I slowed down for a flashing crossing signal and checked to make sure both sides were clear (the signal had been having malfuctions and would activate without a train), the guy behind me layed on his horn. I didn't even come to a complete stop, but even those seconds lost by slowing and checking to be safe were too many for that guy. Also, although truck drivers are generally the safer bunch on the road, it seems a portion of them are just as bad, especially the coal truck drivers. In the last seconds that I see some of the trucks finaly slam on the brakes and just stop short of teh crossing when the train's coming, I wonder how they pulled it off. I was almost sure they were going to taste steel for it. So many close calls...
you at are not telling me anything that I dont know. i am a truck driver and i could tell you stories about cars, trucks,buses and any other kind of moving vehicle known to man trying to test thier invincibility with 9000 tons of steel on a daily basis. I always tell myself that i wont be behind the guy that gets tagged but im sure its going to happen sooner or later. I dive in cincinnati,oh and they are presently putting in a railroad overpass and removing a terrible crossing. At least twice a week they have to replace the crossbuck on the southbound side of the street. And its amazing that even though you can see at least a half mile in each direction these people will wait till the gates are 4 or 5 feet off the ground and then they blast through. The part that scares ne the most is that people with kids in the car are the worst offenders.
When I'm in the cab, I notice that nearly all the "non-believers" remember to wear their seat belts. Interesting priorities.
Ian