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Train theft by escaped youth offenders triggers call for better RR security |
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2007-01-18 |
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By Jim Phillips |
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Athens NEWS Senior Writer |
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In retrospect, maybe a 250,000-pound diesel locomotive wasn’t the best choice for a getaway vehicle. That may be what two teenaged boys were thinking after their arrest in Hocking County early Tuesday morning. The pair, who ran away from the Hocking Valley Community Residential Center in Nelsonville around 8:30 p.m. Monday, were apprehended after they allegedly stole a train - yes, that word was train - and drove it about 12 miles, nearly to Logan, before stopping and giving themselves up. The incident has already triggered a call by a railroad workers’ union for increased railway security, and a response by a state representative who says he’ll re-introduce a security bill that failed to pass the General Assembly earlier. In a dangerous gambit that has local law enforcers shaking their heads in disbelief, the pair of boys, aged 16 and 13, commandeered a locomotive from the Hocking Valley Scenic Railway station and took it to a spot near Ohio Rt. 328 in Hocking County. “When (police) called me up in the middle of the night, they had to explain it to me two or three times,” recalled Athens County Prosecutor C. David Warren. “I kept thinking this was the kind of train that runs around a Christmas tree.” The older boy is from Lawrence County, and the younger boy from neighboring Scioto County. The HVSR, which offers scenic railway tours, is currently shut down for the winter and won’t reopen until April. The young men reportedly took ad |
Better railroad security…
There are some people who are convinced that nirvana is just around the corner, if only the right legislation can get passed…
I agree that legislating a potential problem away would be a terrific solution in a perfect world. What is surprising to me is the interconnected and unintended magnification of a mundane but potentially gaping hole in awareness as our attention is drawn to airplanes as weapons versus rail vehicles by two foolish teenagers. This gap has been pointed out so often as to make this observation a cliche. These kids may have unintentionally triggered a trip wire that focuses attention on the possibility this “hole” may be less theoretical, and more possible to occur than many would like to recognize in a quasi-official manner. Another thought to ponder was that at one point serious consideration was made toward derailing the train. What if instead of a “harmless” consist, this train had a string of toxic chemicals in tow? Derailing it to stop it? Not a comforting consideration in light of a better option.
Good grief. I am thinking that, for a 16 year old, this kid was a combination of smart, careful, adventurous – and extraordinarily if unintentionally dangerous. The difference being “intent.” Time Magazine did a cover story a couple of years ago on brain chemistry in adolescents, and how they are basically wired to do dumb stuff at that age; but most are not that smart. Sixteen years old, and he did everything right – except the part about stealing a train. Kid’s got some stong talents – how do those talents get channeled in the right direction?
Smart teenage kids do dumb things because their lack of life’s experience frequently makes them unaware of the consequences of their acts. Their brains can absorb a lot of information quickly like a dry sponge because their minds have not become soggy or damp with experience.
[#ditto][#ditto][#ditto]! and[banghead][
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I have heard the Chinese practice rail security by having a soldier every 50 yards 24/7 on all tracks. And there was so much secrecy with the old Soviet Railroads that there is little that comes out of there in the way of information.
A simple satellite tracking system similar to the Trucking Qualcomm system will work well with railroad engines. You can see the status of everything including if the ignition was on or off with the option to kill it remotely.
I said this in another post, so I am repeating myself a bit. When one is in one’s teens if something is possible,and you can try to do it, YOU WILL! Never mind the possible consequences! The teen will just plain do whatever he/she wanys to do, and to[censored] with the consequences!
In spring when the HVSR tries to fire that engine up again, they will probably come looking for the 16 year old to glean how he got it running after a period of storage.
Maybe we can send them some old issues of ‘Trains’ magazine. Looks like they will have a lot of time for reading in the near future.
The problem though is that hastily enacted laws often are bad laws. Generally you end up with laws that are unnecessary - either because they cover something that someone would already do generally due to the possibility of legal liability if they don’t do that step or because they prohibit too much and prevent activity that provides social benefit without providing a larger benefit. Here, the goal is to prevent terrorists from stealing a hazardous material train and detonating it within a city. The problem with legislation to solve this problem is that the threat of legal liability from a hazardous material accident already (or should) leads the railroads to take more precautions with those shipments because a hazardous material accident would likely result in a large legal judgement. Thus, any legislation is likely to be redundant from the incentives that already exist from the tort system - and will likely cost more than its attendant benefit.
In a purely efficient s
While I do agree that legislating against potential terrorist activities is a placebo, from the perspective of a potential perpetrator, legalisms are even more abstract if we are discussing the real world potential for sticking some plastic explosives under a tank car. This is more likely than a highjacking although the point of the exercise is to induce terror.If we are talking incentives to provide more security to prevent our perpetrator from his goal of releasing toxic gases from an explosion, although I rue the thought, the unrealized implementation of many of the 9/11 commission’s findings are of little comfort…it would take only one explosion and release of toxic gas to draw the media into reporting the obvious in albeit, more alarmist terms. Although enhanced rail yard security is a no brainer…sitting ducks on a siding give pause for thought. Is this a case where, heaven forbid, there is no real world solution? Cars on a siding require no elaborate plan of highjacking per say…I have a certain amount of empathy for railroad police, while its granted they do go overboard at times…
The problem with preventing the scenario where the person puts explosives under the tank car at the rail siding is that that is the type of thing which is most likely to be done by some sort of “lone nut” with some sort of local grudge. Those are unfortunately the most difficult type of actions to prevent - while conspiracies are rightly considered more dangerous because they can do more sophicated attacks, they have a higher chance of detection because multiple people are involved (recall that the FBI was able to arrest one of the people involved with the 9/11 plot before hand). The best way to prevent a “lone nut” type attack is by restricting access to explosives - naturally, this can be difficult in that many explosives have accepted uses. Still, after the Oklahoma City bombing, the government has tried to warn fertilizer dealers to watch out for people who just don’t seem right. I’m sure that sellers of dynamite do the same thing.
Maybe you could install some sort of visible camera system with a sign about monitoring near the sidings where tank cars are stored. Most of the time, those types of cameras aren’t watched anyway, but it could provide a visible deterrent to such an attack. Not sure about the cost of that (it would also deter graffiti, as well).
OK, I will get on my soap box. As further evidenced by this article, the way we treat juveniles in this country is deplorable. This incident was regretable, but trying them as adult felons who used weapons of mass distruction? Give me a freaking break.
There will be rapists who will get substantially less of a sentence as compared to these two kids. As dangerous as what they did was, I still think it was just one of those things that kids do, and I do not see true malice here–unlike the case of the rapists who will get 1/3 of the sentence as these two kids.
I will spare you all the details about how bad we treat juvenile delinquents in our society, but if you really want to feel bad about things and know how the deck can be stacked against someone who never really had a chance at life, go visit a juvenile facility. We give juveniles less rights than full blown criminals, and we make no serious attempt to rehabilitate them.
Let the first one of you who didn’t do something stupid as a kid throw the first stone–and for those of you who say, but yes, I paid the price, chances are, you just weren’t caught, and if you were, you certainly were not charged as adult felons because you had a parent who gave a darn.
This really sadens me.
Gabe
Also, how many of us can put our hand on a bible and say without hesitation that, in our sixteen-year old mind that thought we could do it safely, we wouldn’t take a joy ride in a locomotive. I probably would not have done it–I was a boring kid though–but, I sure couldn’t swear to that.
Gabe
If this incident had happened in California, those boys would be remanded to Youth Authority (CYA). I have known many, many people who went through CYA. There is only one thing that kids learn there - how to fight. Is it any wonder that most such kids up in occupying cells in the state’s finest institution?
Our system has the idea we are “really going to teach them a lesson.” In my experience with kids, juvenile court, and juvenile “facilities”, they are nothing short of “crime school.”
If the kids weren’t criminals going in, they surely will be coming out.
These kids weren’t criminals. They did something stupid.
Anyone bent on destruction will not be deterred by laws.
In fact, they can be assured of food and shelter for the years it takes to try em should they survive the attempt.
Long ago, courts ruled by sundown and the sentence is immediate, public and rather swift. No so today.
It seems like quite a few Americans have credited the terrorist with having western values towards their own life, which they don’t.
We think in terms of stealing a train, causing an incident, then escaping with our lives.
They, on the other hand, wish to die while committing their crime, which they view not as crimes, but as fulfilling the words of Allah.
Dieing while doing this guarantees a place in heaven for themselves, and their family.
They will not steal a train and “drive” it someplace to blow it up…they are smart enough to realize the train can only go where the tracks do, unlike a truck or car, which can pretty much be driven to a place of your choice.
Keep in mind they understand if they take a train, it will be noticed, and they will not get very far with it, derailing a train is pretty easy, if you know what to do, and I suspect quite a few of them have had some experience in doing just that.
Betty to wait at a crossing and let the cargo come to you, instead of trying to steal it in the first place.
A old Datsun full of explosives parked near the tracks, say in a populated area will be much more effective that trying to steal a train.
Just a matter of timing, you don’t even have to know which train to blow, just look for the tanks…all the info they need to pick the tank car to blow up is already readily available on the internet, just wait till the car gets close enough, run into it and blow yourself up, or make sure there is enough explosives on board to guarantee the tank car gets a few holes poked into it.
You bring up a very valid point-consider the Glendale wreck and substitute a passenger train for a freight train. Even more troubling is the scenario of a hijacked truck and a passenger train. There certainly is enough material to feed a taint of perhaps reasonably founded paranoia.
From Wikipedia:
"Having slashed his wrists and stabbed himself repeatedly in the chest, he parked his car on the tracks to finish the attempt. However, Alvarez changed his mind and attempted to leave the railroad tracks. Because he was unable to dislodge his vehicle from the rain-soaked gravel and slick rails, he abandoned the vehicle moments before the crowded train approached. (There is some speculation that Alvarez may have inflicted the wounds on himself after the crash, based on some early reports by witnesses). Both this causation and the end result have many similarities to that of the Ufton Nervet rail crash in the United Kingdom, which occurred only three months previously, although in that case the driver of the car stayed in the vehicle and was killed.
Some early rumors of the incident being a terrorist attack have been dismissed, as no connections to any terrorist organization exist with the suspect."
Railroad Accident Report
Collision of National Railroad Passenger Corporation (Amtrak)
Train 59 With a Loaded Truck-Semitrailer Combination at a
Highway/Rail Grade Crossing in
Bourbonnais, Illinois
March 15, 1999
NTSB Number RAR-02/01
NTIS Number PB2002-916301