About the Author J. D. Santucci (a.k.a. "Tuch") began his railroading career in 1978 as a trainman on the Missouri Pacific. After a round of lay-offs in 1985, Tuch embarked on a railroad odyssey, working in many different situations for different roads. This column tries to explain some of the nuts and bolts of the job and also demonstrates what we have to deal with on a regular basis within and without the industry. Tuch currently works through freights out of Chicago for Canadian National/Illinois Central. ©1999, 2003-2007 JD Santucci. Logo ©2002 The Railroad Network. By J.D. Santucci

October 18, 2007
Well, it’s October 18th again. This year marks the eighteenth anniversary of the deadly collision between my train and that automobile in Antioch, IL. As has been the case for so many years now, I usually post a story involving another episode involving a train and a motor vehicle. This year though, it is going to be slightly different. We’re going to look at what I missed one evening.

I was working the night Clearing Run transfer assignment at Yard Center in February 1983 as the regular Fireman on the job. It was a Friday evening and I had big plans, so I marked off for the trip. I told the Engineer I was working with that I was not coming into work for that night so he would be aware of the fact that he would have to run the engine all night long. Normally, I ran the engine all night long whether working as the Engineer or the Fireman. I was still fairly new at this Engineer thing having only been promoted for about nineteen months at this point and wanted to run as much as possible. This particular Engineer, Jim “Porky” Reynolds had no issues with letting me at the throttle all night long. Actually, many of the others had no problem letting me run all the time either, which was beneficial to both me and them as it gave me more experience and them a break.

So Friday, February 25th comes and goes and I return to work the following evening. When I reported to work, the caller told me I would be the Engineer that evening as Porky had marked off. All she told me was that something happened last evening that shook him up and he decided to take this night off. Not a problem, I can do this all by myself. When Conductor Tommy Traweek arrived for work I asked him what happened with Porky and he recounted the previous night’s adventure. They had collided with a car at Southwest Highway (Illinois Rt. 7) on Belt Railway of Chicago (BRC) trackage. He said the law boys and paramedics didn’t think the guy they hit was going to make it.

Tommy went on to tell me that this collision was not one of those that you normally hear about on the news; this one involved two different trains. He didn’t have all the details like Porky would as far as what exactly transpired, so I got the lowdown from Porky when he returned to work Tuesday following our rest days of Sunday and Monday.

To digress briefly; as it would happen, there was a collision here in Northwest Indiana recently that involved one automobile and two trains. The driver eventually died of her injuries and two of her children in the car with her at the time of the crash were killed at the scene. What happened in her case was she was literally racing a train to the crossing, running parallel to it through a parking lot and then made a turn at the crossing and shot out across in front of it. There is proof of her racing the train that was retrieved from nearby security cameras that captured much of the action. Unfortunately and tragically for her and her children, she failed to look the opposite way at the crossing and did not see the train approaching from the other direction, This one collided with her car and then pushed into the path of the one she was racing. Need I say more about racing trains to the crossings and railroad crossing safety?

Back to the episode in 1983; Porky recounted what happened the night I marked off. They were heading to the BRC’s Clearing Yard near Midway Airport. The train was heading timetable direction north although according to the compass it was more of a westerly path. The road crossing of Southwest Highway is located about a mile and a half or so south (timetable) of Hayford Junction where the Grand Trunk Western crosses and connects with the BRC. Hayford is also the entrance to Clearing Yard on the east side of the facility. Parallel to Southwest Highway on its east side is Norfolk & Western Railway’s Landers Yard. Southwest Highway itself is a very busy road and the BRC’s double track mainline through here is likewise, very busy. The BRC operates its own trains along with those of MoPac, Louisville & Nashville, Conrail, Norfolk & Western and other roads on this line, so it is a pretty busy piece of railroad.

In the wee hours of the morning of February 26th, my usual assignment of the Clearing Run transfer was approaching Southwest Highway. Simultaneously, a Norfolk & Western train was departing from Clearing Yard and approaching Southwest Highway from the opposite direction. As fate would have it, both trains were converging on the crossing right about the same moment, not unusual at this crossing by any means. A speeding motorist on Southwest Highway decided he could not wait and drove around the lowered gates at the crossing. Proving yet again how gates cannot prevent such stupidity. He drove into the path of the N&W and was struck by this train. The car bounced off and directly into the path of the MoPac train and was again struck. And again, almost like a ball bearing inside of a pinball machine, the car bounced again; off the front of the MoPac train and back into the N&W train, only this time into the side of it.

If you’ve ever looked at a double track railroad, you’ll notice there is not a tremendous amount of room between the two sets of tracks. Now imagine positioning a train on each track and then stuffing a full sized automobile in between them. This is certainly a recipe for tragedy. 

Both trains stopped quickly with the emergency applications of their brakes and crew members immediately went back to assess the situation while both Engineers radioed for assistance. The head brakeman on the MoPac job told me the passenger compartment of the car had been compacted into an area about the size of the space under the hood where the engine would fit. Amazingly enough, the driver had somehow survived this double turned triple collision, although was very critically injured; critically enough to be considered near death. Paramedics had to cut the guy out of the remnants of the car with the Jaws of Life. He was whisked off to the hospital after initial treatment at the scene. Both the police investigating and the paramedics did not believe the guy would make it. Miraculously though, he did. And upon his recovery, he filed lawsuits against both railroads involved. Of course it was the fault of the two railroads that this guy, while disregarding the gates and flashing lights along with the bells and whistles of both locomotives got clobbered.

Proof that yet again that you should not be responsible for your own stupidity, blame it on and sue somebody else. I’m only surprised he didn’t sue all of his teachers in primary, middle and secondary school for failing to properly educate him, his driver’s ed teacher for failing to prevent him from driving like an idiot, the Illinois Department of Transportation for building roads that cross railroad tracks at grade and of course, the manufacturer of his car for not making it train collision proof.

I guess the only redeeming aspect of this entire episode was that I was not there to experience what would have been the first collision of my career between my train and an automobile. Although I knew it would happen at some other point down the road because it happens to all of us that run trains, this was not my first encounter. There are too many motorists out there stupid enough to truly believe they know better and honestly think that it won’t happen to them. And of course we all know that you just can’t fight stupidity.

And so it goes.

Tuch

Hot Times on the High Iron and the HTOTHI initials, ©2005 by JD Santucci.