Yesterday we had a big one…A NB and SB smacked into each other going around 80mph north of Fresno. Someone didn’t make the siding to wait in the hole. The front page of our paper www.fresnobee.com has the pictures.
OR asleep at their computer in Ft. Worth.
There’s video and media reports of this on the Trains forum. It’s a real mess and there were injuries.
Jerry
A key datum here is the 545 AM time. I don’t know what the crew districts are in that neck of the woods but, at 150 miles from SanFran the southbound crew was probably going to tie up at Fresno after all night trying to stay awake as you stare at 2 parrellel rails and your eyelids get to feeling more and more like sandpaper. Been there. Done that. I used to get up and splash water from the cooler on my face and walk around the cab. A lot of guys didn’t bother.
unclebuck,
How do you know they fell asleep?? I looked at every link and nowhere it said they fell asleep. Anyways, very very sad… hope they all make it.
Somebody ROYALLY ****ed up. Hope the crew fully recover.
Brad
I was involved with a train crash… obvious at once what had happened… investigation proved that the exact opposite was the case…
PLEASE wait the report guys! Speculation can become rumour, can become legend…
Hope the crews and their families make out okay.
Honestly, you guys will probably never know the results of the investigation. And details from the news reports are sketchy at best.
Edit:
It’s not dark territory. According to the reports, the crews had plenty of rest. There were no signal or track malfunctions. It could have been mechanical failure, but honestly, it looks like human error.
Nick
Human error has cause a lot of train wrecks…Its part of the job railroaders face every day 365 days a year…I faced it during my 9 1/2 years of railroading.We knew the risk was there but,never thought about it no more then a person does driving a car…
I hope you mean that safe working practice was so ingrained into you that you weren’t aware of thinking about it. The few people I’ve worked with that were oblivious to safety got weeded out pretty fast… fortunatley none of them (so far) by a moving train or by the police taking them off on a homicide charge.
When I meet beginners that listen to advice I compare being trackside with playing football… as soon as you come out of the changing room you should go into an “aware” mode… it should become second nature to know where your team and the opposition are every moment of the game. You don’t think about this, it becomes part of you.
Even with that any distraction can give you a near miss or worse. I’ve recently had an experienced colleague nearly wiped out twice in one night. First was almost certainly domestic troubles in the back of his mind and accessing the track in a drug-selling neighbourhood. The second was probably those two plus the first incident. He’s okay now but I wish he’d remembered to make himself “Stop. Look. Listen”… like I sometimes forget to do…
To quote Hill Street Blues… “Let’s be careful out there”.
www.fresnobee.com today says human error.
David,When I went to braking on the PRR in 1966 I was taught the rules and had to past a written rule test.Which I did.That was the last time I actually glance at a rule book…Why?/ The old line PRR conductors knew the rules and how to bend them without any harm to follow employees or damage to equipment.However,when it came to Form 19 orders or Employee Time Table rules they would not risk any rule infractions nor would they allow any…However,none of us went around with our noses buried in the rule book to insure every move we made was according to the book.That applied to the C&O under the Chessie system as well…
We knew the risks of our jobs but,did not dwell on the possibility of being hurt or killed.
According to one of the articles three crewmen jumped ship before the crash, if the trains were going anywhere near 80mph it’s a genuine miracle none of them were killed.
I second Brakie’s remarks. Safe practices should be second nature. I have to pass a safety exam every year, but I don’t keep nose buried in the rule book… Yes, this is a dangerous job, but do I dwell on that no. If I did, I would never get out of bed in the morning.
Nick