Hack Bridge

Hello;
The other day, there was an article in the local newspaper about a CSX employee who was killed after he fell from the Hack drawbridge into the icy Hackensack River in Kearny NJ.
The Hack bridge is on the P&H line, so I thought it was Conrail's bridge.

Then, a day or two later, I heard some chatter on the radio about the Hack bridge, and apparently repairs are being made.
I guess the guy who died was making emergency repairs, as the accident occurred early in the AM.
Is this bridge slated for replacement anytime soon?
If so, I would assume that any replacement will have to be a movable span, since the track cannot be raised sufficiently to allow a non-movable span.

FW

The artilcle is wrong. Hack Bridge is a Conrail bridge. The employee was a Conrail employee, the bridge operator at the time.

Is this the bridge on the old NJT Boonton Line that crosses under the NEC just East of Portal? I noticed last week that the double line of tank cars parked there for a year or so had been removed.

andegold wrote:Is this the bridge on the old NJT Boonton Line that crosses under the NEC just East of Portal? I noticed last week that the double line of tank cars parked there for a year or so had been removed.

No. Hack Bridge is the Conrail P&H Branch directly next to the Rt7 Whittpenn Bridge, and just north of the PATH Bridge. These bridges are south of DB (Boonton Line) and Lower Hack (NJT M&E)

Thanks for the info. As usual, the newspapers got it wrong.

Are there any details of the accident?

FW

Did anyone learn any more details about this? Hack is a CR, now share assets bridge. The interlocking and bridge office is actually way up high on the PATH bridge looking down on the PATH tracks. The operator controls the CR as well as the PATH bridge. The Path bridge rarely opens and when not opened the signals can be set to fleet.

I have made the climb to Hack, for an official visit, and it is a long climb. I would hate to find it was the operator. Since there are two bridges it could have been anyone from the Op. to a trackworker.

If it was the Op. was it at shift change?

T2

train2 wrote:Did anyone learn any more details about this? Hack is a CR, now share assets bridge. The interlocking and bridge office is actually way up high on the PATH bridge looking down on the PATH tracks. The operator controls the CR as well as the PATH bridge. The Path bridge rarely opens and when not opened the signals can be set to fleet.

I have made the climb to Hack, for an official visit, and it is a long climb. I would hate to find it was the operator. Since there are two bridges it could have been anyone from the Op. to a trackworker.

If it was the Op. was it at shift change?

T2

wolfboy8171981 wrote: The employee was a Conrail employee, the bridge operator at the time.

I stand by this statment. It was the 3rd trick operator, at about 4:45am.

I noticed recently that they installed huge banks of cameras on both approaches to Hack recently, before the accident. Was there a previous incident that predicated this, or was it just a standard security upgrade?

Sad to hear about the operator.. I'm good friends with an operator just upriver from there.