Well, It happened again. This time, a 3 train collision on the same stretch of CSX track that was torn up last summer by a container train derailment. Acording to semi-accurate news reports, a Westbound with empty tank cars had some sort of mechanical malfunction and was stalled on the track. This train was rear ended by a train on the same track and engines and cars got scattered across the right of way.
If this wasn't bad enough, along come's an Eastbound manifest freight and he plow's into the carnage and derail's. Early report's from local news sources say's some crew members were taken to our local area hospitals, and very fortunately, there were no fatalities. Some homes to the North and East were evacuated as a precaution until fire fighters found the source of the fires.
This stretch of CSX mainline run's thru a very narrow strip of right of way that's heavily tree lined, rural and is very curvy. Whether or not this had anything to do with the accident isn't known. I was able to get to one of the crossings on our 400 East road that wasn't police blocked and got some grainy pic's of the head end of the stalled train. Down in this area, the only way to see anything is from a helicopter.
This is a horrible area to get heavy equipment into. It's like the track is laid out in a gully and there's not too many main roads to use to get cranes and low boys into the site. Man, R.J. Corman's going to be busy with this one. I'll give whoever get's this job a week to a week and a half to reopen the main again, weather permitting. Last Summer's wreck cleanup took 11 days.
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