An unfortunate accident occured in Raceland Kentucky. Here is the link for more info.
http://www.herald-dispatch.com/homepage/x1119736741
Godbless the family and crew involved.
That’s gotta be horifically sad for him and the family. Thanks for the news.
OUCH!!! What happened to three step protection?[banghead]
I’ve heard it said that victims of getting pinned in the knuckles of couplers stay alive until the cars are pulled apart. In one story I read, the authorities called the wife to tell her that she should get down to the yard right away, there’s been an accident. Meanwhile paramedics are pumping his bloodstream with morphine to kill the pain while they wait for loved ones to arrive to say their final goodbyes for when the cars are pulled apart…well, you know what happens next.
Any truth to this or is it urban myth?
From what little the story told from that link he was on a moving locomotive, and not going between equipment. Luckily I have never been around when that has happened so I can’t answer your question. Thoughts and prayers go out to him and his family.
I wouldn’t say that that’s what happens in every case, because I’m sure that at least one of the fatalities that occurred in our yard was where the employee was coupled, and death was reasonably instaneous (i.e., Ken was dead when they found him). But I heard the story soon after I hired out (see below for how long ago that was). I’d suggest that it may have happened once, somewhere.
As for the incident at hand, it sounds like the employee, for some inexplicable reason, rode his locomotive into the side of another unyelding car or cut of cars. I don’t think that there’s any way that the cars could have run into him, based on the report. So (this is conjecture only, of course), he was either not looking where he was going or not paying attention. He should have been able to climb the stairs to safety, had he been riding in the proper place. Of course, another possibility would be that his engine derailed and pinned him, but I’m pretty sure the report would have covered that.
Please, I hope someone can tell me I’m wrong about this.
It is possible. When I was an EMT, we were always told, in the case of a puncture, or other type wound, to leave the object in the victim, stabilize it, bandage around it, and then transport. This was taught to us, because if we were to remove an object, say a screw driver that had entered the victim’s abdomen, it is possible that more damage could be done during removal, and that object is also stemming the blood flow, to remove it would be inviting a hemmorhage… Now, while being crushed in a coupling accident, it is not as simple as a puncture wound like that, but, depending how the person was caught in the mechanism, it could still apply. The pressure applied by the weight of the coupler and cars could prevent a massive hemmorhage, but, it wouldn’t prevent it indefinitely, I would estimate 10 minutes at most before the pain and the trauma made the victim unconscious. I wouldn’t quote odds on how likely it is, and I don’t have any case study to go on, but given what I learned, and what I have seen, I would imagine it is a possibility that it could happen that way…
Anyhow, that story is just another reminder that railroading is indeed hard, and dangerous work. Prayers are going out to the family…
with what details i know about this… the conductor wasnt coupled up… but since i dont know what other facts are in the line of public domain…that is all i am going to say pending the offical report…
csx engineer
If you’re referring to the Ken I believe you are, I heard about his death when I was in class at CP Rail with another former CNW employee. A real shame. Ken was quite the character and a good guy to work with.
Chris
It sounds plausible except that couplers are so large that it is hard to see them as inflicting what might be called a puncture wound that is not immediately fatal if a person were caught directly between them.
In any case, I have heard the exact same story as above almost word for word describing an accident on the Milwaukee Road in St. Paul, which happened some time prior to the late 1960s. I don’t know whether those who told it to me witnessed it, but they seemed to have first hand information. I seem to recall that the victim was working on cars in the RIP track.
I have heard a very similar story from a credible person who was a co-worker with the person involved. The brakeman thought that he was on the track that was beside the track where the hitch would be made. Well, he was on the wrong track and ended up getting coupled in. The pressure kept him alive, so someone brought down one of the huge mobile phones (this was in the late 60’s early 70’s) and the guy talked to his wife and family and said goodbye. They then separated the cars and that ended it.
Thoughts and prayers go out to the family of the CSX employee. No one deserves to have that happen to them.
It’s an urban myth - and an EMT friend told it to me back around 1994.
I guess it just goes to show that four people will rather elaborately lend credence to such a silly story before one will run a quick search and post the link: http://www.snopes.com/horrors/techno/lastkiss.asp
[:P]
I like Snopes for some things, but that particular explination doesn’t offer any medical evidence as to why or why not this myth is false. Railroad cars aren’t shredders, they’re not ringed with sharp objects, and they don’t have the same force as a steel roller as mentioned in the Snopes link. I’d agree with the people who say that leaving the pressure might hold off further internal injury for at least a short while.
Either way, I know someone who was almost pinned, and got hit with a coupler and broke some ribs and punctured a lung. Hes still with us, thankfully, but I look twice every time before coupling anything now.
I guess as a side note, when I’m watching other people work on the railroad, or with other heavy equipment, I try and keep these things in mind :
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Wheres “out” if something goes wrong? (What direction/where am I going to go)
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"Snake on the “sidewalk” approach. Find a spot where it doesn’t matter if I’m standing there or not. Regardless of my presence, where would the machine operator/engineer want to hit least? (As in, at a construction site, you’re going to try not to back into the adjoining completed building with the front-end loader, so try and stand close to/flat against the wall… Yes, the loader could still hit the wall, in that case, refer to rule #1) Don’t just stop in an arbitrary place where you could get run over.
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Either make it known you’re around, stay out of the way, and in the operators/engineers vision, or stay totally out of the way where the machine is/might go. It drives me nuts when I have people popping in and out of view, and I don’t know where they went, especially climbing on the back of my electric motor when trying to do switching.
A person can stay alive for a short while after being coupled up. I don’t know if the whole stay alive till the cars are seperated thing is true, guess it would depend on how long the person was coupled. Death is not always instant. A couple years ago a man was coupled and the other members of his crew found out when they heard him scream over the radio. Not sure how long he lived afterwards.
Sounds to me like he may have been riding down on the steps and they hit a car left fowling another track. Like a car in a yard track no quite clearing the ladder and they went by and he happened to be on the corner that side swiped the car.