Important Railroad Crossing Information
Jan 26, 2013, 11:15 am
#1
Original Poster
Join Date: May 2006
Location: Wichita
Posts: 628
Important Railroad Crossing Information
Yesterday, we had an unusual situation involving an overturned cement truck and an BNSF train approaching at 40 mph. Thanks to a heroic sheriff's officer, all were safe. But, bystanders put themselves in danger. I hope it is OK to post this important railroad crossing information you might not have heard before: http://meteorologicalmusings.blogspo...emergency.html
Jan 27, 2013, 8:56 am
#2
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Join Date: Feb 2000
Location: Easton, CT, USA
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Sorry, it's much easier to just dial 911, say there's somebody stuck on the crossing, and let them call the railroad. Wasting time, putting yourself in danger looking for a number on a 4x4 piece of wood right next to the tracks where there's a cement truck laying across the tracks and a train approaching is setting yourself up for a darwin award.
The police should know who to call without calling one number and being transferred to another one. Whatever delay the DOT believes there is in calling 911 will be far shorter than you running around looking for a building or a post with a number on it.
This incident was crawling with first responders, police, etc. You are saying that nobody notified the railroad? We know for a fact that they instead just stood around waving their arms?
Sorry, I don't buy it at all.
Some deputies began driving parallel to the tracks trying to get the engineer to stop the train, said sheriff’s Lt. Brad Hoch. Others tried to relay word to the railroad company through its dispatcher about what was happening.
No, wait, they did contact the dispatcher and not just stand by waving their hands.
They also drove cars with flashing lights up along the tracks to get the engineers attention.
It can take well over a mile or more to stop a freight train. In this case, there was probably not enough time for anything to have changed the outcome, the train was already too close when the truck rolled over to be stopped.
Obviously, the deputies here at the scene were on our radios trying to relay through dispatchers as quickly as possible to get the track shut down, we even had deputies get into their patrol cars with red lights and sirens and try to go parallel to tracks and try to flag the train down to let 'em know that we had this coming," said Lt. Brad Hoch, Sedgwick County Sheriff's Department.
The police should know who to call without calling one number and being transferred to another one. Whatever delay the DOT believes there is in calling 911 will be far shorter than you running around looking for a building or a post with a number on it.
This incident was crawling with first responders, police, etc. You are saying that nobody notified the railroad? We know for a fact that they instead just stood around waving their arms?
Sorry, I don't buy it at all.
Some deputies began driving parallel to the tracks trying to get the engineer to stop the train, said sheriff’s Lt. Brad Hoch. Others tried to relay word to the railroad company through its dispatcher about what was happening.
No, wait, they did contact the dispatcher and not just stand by waving their hands.
They also drove cars with flashing lights up along the tracks to get the engineers attention.
It can take well over a mile or more to stop a freight train. In this case, there was probably not enough time for anything to have changed the outcome, the train was already too close when the truck rolled over to be stopped.
Obviously, the deputies here at the scene were on our radios trying to relay through dispatchers as quickly as possible to get the track shut down, we even had deputies get into their patrol cars with red lights and sirens and try to go parallel to tracks and try to flag the train down to let 'em know that we had this coming," said Lt. Brad Hoch, Sedgwick County Sheriff's Department.
Last edited by cordelli; Jan 27, 2013 at 9:24 am
Jan 29, 2013, 8:48 am
#3
Join Date: Jan 2003
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Sorry, it's much easier to just dial 911, say there's somebody stuck on the crossing, and let them call the railroad. Wasting time, putting yourself in danger looking for a number on a 4x4 piece of wood right next to the tracks where there's a cement truck laying across the tracks and a train approaching is setting yourself up for a darwin award.
The police should know who to call without calling one number and being transferred to another one. Whatever delay the DOT believes there is in calling 911 will be far shorter than you running around looking for a building or a post with a number on it.
The police should know who to call without calling one number and being transferred to another one. Whatever delay the DOT believes there is in calling 911 will be far shorter than you running around looking for a building or a post with a number on it.
The phone number is a direct line to that railroad's police department. If you don't provide the crossing ID, they know what questions to ask and can quickly narrow down your location. Once they know where you are, they contact the correct dispatcher.
If you call 911, they may not know what questions to ask. There are plenty of examples of law enforcement and 911 being ignorant when it comes to railroads. Depending on your location, there could be multiple railroads in the area. Which railroad company should we call? What street are you at? Well, there could be more than one railroad company with a line that crosses Main Street. You could have the same railroad with different lines crossing Main Street. Those different lines could each have a different dispatcher.
Assuming 911 gathers all the relevant information, who is the dispatcher going to call? Probably the same number posted on the crossing. All you've done is slow the process down and introduce a huge margin of error.
Jan 29, 2013, 3:08 pm
#4
In Memoriam
Join Date: Feb 2000
Location: Easton, CT, USA
Programs: ua prem exec, Former hilton diamond
Posts: 31,801
Sorry, there's a cement truck across the tracks and there's a train coming.
I'm dialing 911, I'm not getting out, going to look for a sign on the side of the track that may or may not be readable.
In this example the police were already in contact with the dispatcher for the railroad. There was no confusion as to where it was or which railroad it was (really, how many people live someplace where there are too many railroads for them to be confused as to which one it is?)
In this case, dialing the number on the crossing post, assuming it was even there, would have resulted in the exact same thing, a train hitting the truck.
The assumption that the first responders don't know what to do in half of the posts in this thread is insulting to anybody who is a first responder.
So lets see just how helpful the dispatchers can be. On the line I ride every day two years ago in insane heat, a train got stuck. Passengers on the train started calling 911, because it was fairly obvious the railroad didn't care.
What did the dispatcher tell the police when they called?
"We were concerned because obviously we knew that there were people on the train subjected to high heat, we had some indications there may be some pregnant people that were on the train and they need medical attention," says Sgt. Rich Frazier, Westport Police Department.
At first police couldn't locate the train, MTA in New York could not give an exact location, then told them, the train was empty. The stranded passengers were finally found close to a mile west of the Sherwood Island Connector, sitting on the tracks at a dead standstill.
"With hundreds of others on the trains, this has the potential to skyrocket into a major incident so we dispatched all three of our ambulances down here, we also requested mutual aid," says Marc Hartog, Westport EMS Coordinator.
The town made the call to dispatch ambulances, not the railroad
The town called for mutual aid from the other towns in the area, not the railroad dispatchers
If it were left the dispatchers, the train would still be there.
In that case the emergency officials told them to stop all train traffic, they were going to find the train that the dispatchers insisted wasn't there. The dispatcher had no clue where the train was, that it was stuck for enough time that people were passing out and needed medical attention, and couldn't be bothered to actually try to verify with the train via radio what the true story was.
You call who you want, I'll call people who can actually do something to help.
I'm dialing 911, I'm not getting out, going to look for a sign on the side of the track that may or may not be readable.
In this example the police were already in contact with the dispatcher for the railroad. There was no confusion as to where it was or which railroad it was (really, how many people live someplace where there are too many railroads for them to be confused as to which one it is?)
In this case, dialing the number on the crossing post, assuming it was even there, would have resulted in the exact same thing, a train hitting the truck.
The assumption that the first responders don't know what to do in half of the posts in this thread is insulting to anybody who is a first responder.
So lets see just how helpful the dispatchers can be. On the line I ride every day two years ago in insane heat, a train got stuck. Passengers on the train started calling 911, because it was fairly obvious the railroad didn't care.
What did the dispatcher tell the police when they called?
"We were concerned because obviously we knew that there were people on the train subjected to high heat, we had some indications there may be some pregnant people that were on the train and they need medical attention," says Sgt. Rich Frazier, Westport Police Department.
At first police couldn't locate the train, MTA in New York could not give an exact location, then told them, the train was empty. The stranded passengers were finally found close to a mile west of the Sherwood Island Connector, sitting on the tracks at a dead standstill.
"With hundreds of others on the trains, this has the potential to skyrocket into a major incident so we dispatched all three of our ambulances down here, we also requested mutual aid," says Marc Hartog, Westport EMS Coordinator.
The town made the call to dispatch ambulances, not the railroad
The town called for mutual aid from the other towns in the area, not the railroad dispatchers
If it were left the dispatchers, the train would still be there.
In that case the emergency officials told them to stop all train traffic, they were going to find the train that the dispatchers insisted wasn't there. The dispatcher had no clue where the train was, that it was stuck for enough time that people were passing out and needed medical attention, and couldn't be bothered to actually try to verify with the train via radio what the true story was.
You call who you want, I'll call people who can actually do something to help.