I’m sorry she’s gone, and her husband must be devistated - but I’ve never heard of one like this. She smashed through the lowered crossing gates while talking on a cell phone.
http://www.suntimes.com/output/news/cst-nws-train14.html
I’m glad there was no “conductor” error. He/she might have incorrectly punched a ticket and contributed to the accident. Glad he/she didn’t. I hate the media.
The article should read “School teacher killed by CELL PHONE !!!”
Amen to that.
I did find it curious that when I viewed the linked page the ad at the top was for Amtrak…
As bad as the accident was, it was her fault she wasnt paying any attention
Not all that weird, it’s just that people need to pay attention to DRIVING!!![soapbox] Cell phone or otherwise, drivers are just too distracted by anything and everything and can be a real danger to themselves and others.
-Mark
http://www.geocities.com/fuzzybroken
http://www.nrg.to/fuzzyworld
Does this qualify as a Darwin Award?
Just another reason to start installing barrier gates…[sigh]
Randy
Well I guess in her case she ptoved she could not do 2 seperate things at the same time. [:p]
[quote]
Originally posted by greyhounds
Don’t tell the groups against cellphones that… This will be another example they will use in the pu***o make it illegal to talk and drive at the same time, in as many cities as possible. A few people can’t do two things at once, so everybody else has to suffer. It’s unfortunate our legal system always has to use the worse case scenarios as it’s benchmark.
Dave
-DPD Productions - Home of the TrainTenna RR Monitoring Antenna-
http://eje.railfan.net/dpdp/
I find it especially interesting that they say it was a Rock Island train that hit her! I guess all those stories about The Rock going bankrupt in 1980 are just a conspiracy. The truth is out now!
I also got an ad for The New Amtrak.com at the top of the page. Rather ironic.
I came across a study done by the police awhile back that stated: A person driving and talking on a celphone has the same attention problems that a legaly drunk person has. If you drink, or use celphones while driving,stay off the road!!!
I feel the same way about someone that tells me they can talk on the phone safely while driving, as I do someone who says they can drink and drive safely.
I don’t do either… If I drink, I get a cab. If I talk on the celphone, I pull over and stop.
I’m a tugboat captain and I don’t drive the tug and talk on the phone either.
It’s official name is the “Rock Island District” of Metra. It operates on the former Rock Island tracks.
Metra is the Chicago area commuter rail authority.
The story says her husban was there imediately and that he was just on the other side of the tracks waiting for her. Didn’t he hear the train coming? He could have warned her! Then again, the general public are totally oblivious to trains, the train could have been blowing it’s horn the entire time and neither of them knew any better, pity.
It’s WAY, WAY more than a few. In my experience almost every time some knucklehead wanders into my lane at 70 miles an hour, or runs a stop light, or runs into me on a subway platform, they are on a cellphone either yapping about something inconsequential or trying to impress everyone around with their importance. Let me guess, you are one of those people who think you can drive 80 mph while the rest of the traffic is doing 50 mph.
Having been nearly hit by a driver on a cell phone - I offer the following account, published, IIRC, in a public safety periodical:
Woman was involved in an collision (I’d call it an accident, but it appears to have been anything but). Nothing too serious, minor injuries. When responders went to her vehicle to check on her condition they had to tap on the window to get her attention, as she was talking on the cell phone. She waved them off, too busy to be bothered, despite the fact that she had probably just caused the collision. IIRC, she did the same thing to the cop…
The husband in question probably didn’t see the train either - remember, he was on the cell phone, too.
ok guys, instead of just saying “cell phone bad bad her fault” (which i do agree), we should be saying how horrible it must have been for her husband to have watched her die like that. I for one, want to say that i give the family best wishes and codolences.
In Ontario, a law was passed banning hand-held cell phone use while operating a moter vehicle. You would believe how many car vs car or other moter vehicle collisions were a result of cell phone use; it’s no surprise that this could happen to. In fact I think I may have heard of a few train car collisions similar to this one in Ontario and Quebec. One I believe involved the VIA Canadian near Barrie Ontario and a woman and her children, another happened near the boarder of Ontario on the Quebec side involving a CN intermodal and a mini van. Can’t remember the details though, it just seems to be a common occurance in my mind. There must be similar incidents in the U.S too unfortunately as I don’t think this was the first.
I’ll call your “wierd” and raise you one:
Within the last month in Denver, we had a car broadside a stopped train at a well lit crossing (crossbucks, no signals), striking a hopper car with 1 week old extra visibility scotchlite relective tape just applied by the shop. Fatality.
The train had just set out two lumber loads and was pumping up the air.
Looks like the feds got that reg right, kinda like the privacy locks on the toilet doors, maybe not a bad idea but the absence of one is a non complying condition.
Yet another casualty of dumb-***.[:(!]
Another reason all 50 states should ban talking on cell phones while driving.Another Darwin Award candidate[xx(]!