Today on my way to work, I realized what day it was and remembered a terrible tragedy that struck my high school 24 years ago.
On that Monday morning in 1990, one of my classmates was on his way to school. Driving the same route every morning, everything was always the same, including the railroad crossing just south of our high school where the road crossed Conrail's former Pennsy main west of Bucyrus, Ohio. Never seeing any trains at that time of the day, he, like many others in the area, ran the stop signs and crossbucks at the unprotected crossing, never slowing down or even looking in either direction.
However, that morning was different. At the moment Dale drove into the crossing at 50 MPH, Amtrak's westbound Capitol Limited, running late, entered the crossing at 70 MPH. Dale's car went into the forward truck of the lead F40PH, twisting the engine portion upside down to the rest of the car, shoving it into the passenger compartment, and spinning the car down along the track. Dale was killed instantly.
While dealing with what happened 24 years ago has been easier as the years have passed, it still haunts me as well as my classmates about what happened and how easily life can be cut short. Please be careful when out railfanning and when behind the wheel and make sure your loved ones understand the importance of being careful, too.
http://chatanuga.org/HOL.html
Kevin
http://chatanuga.org/RailPage.html
http://chatanuga.org/WLMR.html
rlukeThanks for sharing that story. We can never have too many reminders about safety at RR crossings.
Kevin:
Thank you for the reminder on Highway-Rail Grade Crossing Safety.
Today is March 15,2014 on March 15,1999 a similar, sad story was happening. The Place was Bourbonaise,Ill. It involved a semi loaded with steel, trying to beat a Southbound train... That train was the AMTRAK's (nee:ICRR's) City of New Orleans. Approaching the crossing at 79 MPH.
The truck driver had been weighing his truck at a scale at the steel mill; he saw the approaching headlights, and (apparently, he thought it was a long freight train). He raced off the scale, and into the Crossing. The result was that 11 people died (The majority of which were school age children returning to Memphis,Tn. from a shopping trip to Chicago), and millions of dollars in damages. Real and personal, as collateral to this incident.
That single accident changed the Gov. Rules for Truck Drivers, (from then, to this day) The newly required CDL (Commercial Driving Driving License) Then had a number of new punitive rules added to be observed, and administered by the Federal DOT, and the individual, State's Enforcement Branches.
Kevin; It is always terrible to loose friends at a young age, and it does never seem to get any easier. I am sorry, to you, and for your classmates that had to suffer the loss of your Classmate, Dale.
Both incidents prove the old Axiom:"... that one cannot tell the speed of an approaching train when close to a crossing.." That is because there are no reference points to be able to properly judge the speed of the approaching train.
samfp1943That single accident changed the Gov. Rules for Truck Drivers, (from then, to this day) The newly required CDL (Commercial Driving Driving License) Then had a number of new punitive rules added to be observed, and administered by the Federal DOT, and the individual, State's Enforcement Branches.
Unfortunately there is little in the training and exams for the CDL concerning railroads. I wish they would pound into the drivers one simple idea: if you can see a train approaching your current position, it will likely be impossible for it to stop prior to passing your current position. That would eliminate any idea that a train can make up for your error in judgement by slowing down or stopping, an issue in many accidents. Non-railfans just don't know that it takes miles to stop some trains, and most think trains slow down going through towns as a car must.
In the past I drove a semi on the side of my other job, and had I not known about trains from watching them closely since I was a railfan at 11 I could have been hit several times when something unexpected happened (e.g.., left turn lane, green arrow, an elderly driver changed his mind and stopped dead with me behind him on a crossing).
All high-speed rail crossing must have protective gates on both lanes and alarm lights.
It would be safer if all the grade crossing over tracks for high-speed passenger trains be redesigned with some sort of an overpass that is a reasonable grade.
If a grade crossing is removed some type of overpass has to be built. It could be a wide radius curve up to a gradual straight ramp to get the autos and trucks up over the tracks.
Watch my videos on-line at https://www.youtube.com/user/AndrewNeilFalconer
samfp1943 Both incidents prove the old Axiom:"... that one cannot tell the speed of an approaching train when close to a crossing.." That is because there are no reference points to be able to properly judge the speed of the approaching train.
Actually, in Dale's case, he simply didn't see the train approaching. He was only doing 50 MPH going into the crossing, and everybody at school kept saying the same thing that week: there was never a train at the crossing at that time of the day. As a result, a lot of people just ran the stop signs at the crossing thinking that there would never be a train. It's also possible that with the rising sun in the east (this was 1990, before DST was changed), the sun might have impaired his view if he did look.
I know I've read comments online of "Darwin awards" and people driving stupidly around crossings. Dale was not one of those. He was a smart person who simply made a mistake. Unfortunately, that lapse of caution at one location on his drive to school cost him his life.
Sad story indeed. A railfan friend and I were train watching in the town of Darien, NY in early '80's. Two semi's from the Fisher-Price plant were traveling north on Rte. 77. The 'bells and lights' crossing never went on this particular morning. The 1st semi got across the tracks but the west bound N&W hit the second semi in the center of the trailer spinning the rear half back in the direction it came and the front half and tractor made it across and stopped. Somehow, nobody was injured. We were two roads down the tracks and heard the impact from there.
Mr_Dave 1947
eolafanEXPECT A TRAIN ON ANY TRACK...AT ANY TIME...IN ANY DIRECTION!!!
Back around 1900, people living along the tracks got used to trains running on time. They even set their clocks according to the passage of scheduled trains. They expected trains when they were due, and paid less attention when they were not due. So a late train caught people off guard at crossings. A late train was more likely to hit people at crossings than a train on time.
It's rough losing friends this way. 46 years ago on January 28, in the very last days of the New York Central, three of my friends were hit in Central Ohio, by a northbound that they drove out in front of. Just like that, life was over for two of them a high school sophomore and a junior. The third passenger survived and lives to this day. It can happen so fast. And oh, the emotional effect and turmoil that it has on the surviving family.
Dwight Branch:
You are absolutely correct about the lack of pertinent information regarding CDL Training and Professional Truck Driver Driving . The complete lack of information was the rule rather than the exception during the implementation of the Federal CDL requirements ( I got mine in July 1993).
In 1998 I went to the Atlanta area as Terminal Safety Mgr. for a medium sized carrier. Shortly after that there was an accident in North Georgia between a CSX Train and a School Bus. My company got very involved with the Ga Motor Trucking Assoc. and Ga. Operation Lifesaver ( spurred by our drivers had three incidents with our trucks and trains.)
One of the outcomes of that was a cooperation between GMTA,its members, and AAR, and ATA, and OLI, the result was a pretty informative movie tape " Your License or Your Life". It utilized drivers, and their equipment from our company, Roadway, and FedEx, and Norfolk Southern RR, local Law Enforcement. The drivers chosen for it were representatives of ATA Regional driving Competitions.
The accident of March 15,1999 at Bourbonaise, Il. The Trucker, and The 'City of New Orleans' is pretty well documented, and Searchable on the 'NET.
It resulted in a number of punitive, new rules regarding Truck Drivers, and incidents at Highway/Railroad crossings.
Chatanuga: Thank you for your efforts on behalf of your late friend and Operation Lifesaver. I am familiar with that crossing. Ironically that fall The Capital Limited stopped using that route.
"Mom! 99 is blowing for 16th Street. Dad will be home soon."
samfp1943The accident of March 15,1999 at Bourbonaise, Il. The Trucker, and The 'City of New Orleans' is pretty well documented, and Searchable on the 'NET.
I grew up about 70 miles from there and recall that accident, I actually had that in mind when I was talking about how some truckers take chances not knowing a train can't recover for their mistake. Another bad one was about five or so years earlier near Chicago. A busy highway paralleling a railroad had been expanded so that intersecting roads didn't have space for a whole bus between the railroad and the busy street/ highway, but the bus had to climb up and over the tracks to be able to make a right turn, and the back of the bus would hang over the tracks. Finally the tragic coincidence happened, the driver was waiting for traffic to clear when a train approached, the children screamed but the bus didn't move, the train hit the bus and several children were killed. Any alternative would have been better than that, pull into traffic and get hit by a car or whatever, the bus driver just didn't know enough about trains.
DwightBranch ... if you can see a train approaching your current position, it will likely be impossible for it to stop prior to passing your current position.
... if you can see a train approaching your current position, it will likely be impossible for it to stop prior to passing your current position.
That's going to vary with the terrain. To cite a non-railroad example: when we moved to Texas from Pennsylvania more than 25 years ago, we were marked as recent arrivals from Yankee land by our habit of waiting a long time at intersections for other cars to approach and pass. In our experience, if you could see a car coming, you didn't dare pull out because the other car was already too close. Here, you might see an approaching car for 5 or 10 minutes even if he's running at 50 mph or better. You might never pull out unless there is no other traffic at all.
The point is that the driver has to use his best judgment and that, unfortunately, is not always good enough.
ChuckAllen, TX
cefinkjr That's going to vary with the terrain. To cite a non-railroad example: when we moved to Texas from Pennsylvania more than 25 years ago, we were marked as recent arrivals from Yankee land by our habit of waiting a long time at intersections for other cars to approach and pass. In our experience, if you could see a car coming, you didn't dare pull out because the other car was already too close. Here, you might see an approaching car for 5 or 10 minutes even if he's running at 50 mph or better. You might never pull out unless there is no other traffic at all. The point is that the driver has to use his best judgment and that, unfortunately, is not always good enough.
Well, the point I am making is that trains aren't cars, and what you do when deciding to merge with cars can't be the same with trains. For truck drivers there is a similar rule to what you mention: when you are being trained they will tell you when trying to turn into traffic that you have to go, you can't wait forever. By that is meant that you can't be bashful, you can't worry about inconveniencing people and making them mad that they must slow down, because you might never be able to get on the road that way, it just takes too long to turn a corner and accelerate through all the gears in a truck. But if you do that with trains, just pull out and it's too bad if they get mad, you can get yourself killed, because they might not be able to stop in time. You might be able to see a train miles away, but they might not see you, especially if there are curves of any kind on the rail line. And if the train is within a mile away and is a heavy freight, forget it. And it is one thing to drive quickly across if you see a train a mile away, it is another to stay on the tracks becasue your path is somehow blocked and assume the train will stop.
I remember that day as it was in Fox River Grove IL. The bus driver was a substitute driver as the reg one was out sick. I was coming home from the night shift at work in Crystal Lake IL. an traffic was backed up all the way into Cary where my house was at the time. I got home and saw 3 to 5 news choppers in the sky and knew at that time that something bad happened. I saw overhead shots from the choppers that a train had hit the school bus. When I was going to school in Fox River Grove I would cross at that very crossing going to and coming home every day.The train was an express from Crystal Lake that did not stop in Fox River Grove. The bus driver did not know that there was not enough room for the bus to fit between the highway and the railroad tracks.The express hit the rear overhang of the bus spinning it around and removing the body from the chassis. When the investigation was finished at the accident scene a friend of ours fathers excavating company used a lowboy trailer to move the body to a local body shop. I used to live 1 block from the highway where they passed with the trailer,my wife and a bunch of friends that i grew up with in Fox River Grove walked over to RT 14 to watch the body and chassis go by on the trailer under police escort.It was a pretty sad time around Fox River Grove for quite some time. The crossing is now named Seven Angels crossing in memory of the 7 students that passed away that day.
Expressman's Kid Chatanuga: Thank you for your efforts on behalf of your late friend and Operation Lifesaver. I am familiar with that crossing. Ironically that fall The Capital Limited stopped using that route. "Mom! 99 is blowing for 16th Street. Dad will be home soon."
Are you from the Bucyrus area of Ohio? If I remember right, there had been other accidents at that crossing, but none had been that bad. The one before Dale's crash involved a cheerleader heading home from a football or basketball game at the high school. She tried to stop for a slow-moving Conrail train when her brakes failed. Fortunately, she was treated and released.
For at least three years, you could count on at least one truck a year sliced open on the Mon Line of the NS. Even though the coal drags are limited to about 40 through town, They still sliced them open. No one was killed in those three years. Then there was the time the fire department had to put a fire out across the tracks, and put the hoses OVER the rails and were shocked when a train came by and cut up the fire hoses.
(My Model Railroad, My Rules)
These are the opinions of an under 35 , from the east end of, and modeling, the same section of the Wheeling and Lake Erie railway. As well as a freelanced road (Austinville and Dynamite City railroad).
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