ABC News – by MICHAEL BIESECKER and JONATHAN DREW
The 127-ton tractor-trailer that derailed an Amtrak train at a railroad crossing in North Carolina was about three times the size and weight of a standard 18-wheeler, so huge it required a Highway Patrol escort, and so tall that it had to take back roads around some Interstate overpasses.
Authorities say the truck driver involved in Monday’s crash that injured 55 people was struggling to negotiate a tight left-hand turn across the tracks from one two-lane highway to another with this enormous load when the passenger train came roaring around a curve in the tiny community of Halifax.
A special state permit enabled the transport company to exceed length and weight limits as it hauled the electrical distribution facility made by PCX Corp. to New Jersey. It said the tractor and trailer was 164 feet long, with 13 axles to support the combined weight of 255,000 pounds. A standard 18-wheeler has five axles and tops out at 80,000 pounds.
“It was a big project,” Dean A. Di Lillo, a PCX Corp. vice president, told The Associated Press on Tuesday. He declined to put a value on Monday’s destruction.
An eyewitness said the driver was trying to moving back and forth over the tracks for about 8 minutes before impact.
Between 30 and 35 passenger and freight trains use this stretch of CSX railroad daily, but no officials provided any indication that CSX or Amtrak was warned of the driver’s difficulties at the crossing.
“That’s all going to be part of the investigation,” CSX spokeswoman Kristin Seay said.
Amber Keeter, 19, stuck in traffic with her baby directly behind the tractor-trailer, told the AP that the crew spent a long time preparing to cross the tracks at the intersection of highways U.S. 301 and N.C. 903 in Halifax County, North Carolina, only to get stuck because of the load’s length.
She said she rolled down her window and asked a flag man if he could alert the railroad, but “he said he didn’t think so.”
Then, “the railroad lights started blinking, and so the tractor-trailer driver tried to gun it forward,” she said. The driver jumped out “just a couple of seconds before” the crash.
Well-established protocols require truck drivers and their trooper escorts to “clear their routes and inform the railroad dispatchers what they’re doing,” said Steve Ditmeyer, a former Federal Railroad Administration official who teaches railway management at Michigan State University. And even if they lose contact, a toll-free emergency number is prominently displayed at each crossing.
“That dispatcher would have immediately put up a red signal for Amtrak and radioed Amtrak to stop,” Ditmeyer said.
In this case, the train engineer “didn’t know about the truck until he was coming around a curve. He had no long vision,” Ditmeyer said.
Alerting the railroad wasn’t the responsibility of the trooper, who had only 25 seconds or so to react after the approaching New York-bound train set off warning lights and the crossing arms came down, North Carolina Highway Patrol Spokesman Lt. Jeff Gordon said.
The train’s conductor, Keenan Talley of Raleigh, was among the injured.
The truck driver, John Devin Black of Claremont, escaped without injury. The Associated Press was unable to reach Black on Tuesday. His listed phone numbers rang as disconnected. The rig owner and permit-holder, Guy M. Turner Inc. of Greensboro, did not respond to an email requesting comment.
Most of the passengers treated at hospitals were released by Tuesday. By then, about a dozen of the train’s 212 passengers had already continued their journey by bus to Richmond, Virginia, where they could take another train.
“We’re just thankful that we’re still alive. It could have been really worse. God was really with us,” said Lisa Carson, 50, of Philadelphia.
The Federal Railroad Administration’s database shows at least five previous collisions at the same Halifax crossing, all involving vehicles on the tracks. The most recent was in 2005, when a freight train hit a truck’s “utility trailer.” In 1977, an Amtrak train hit a car at 70 mph. The driver got out in time, but a railroad employee was injured, that accident report said.
Monday’s collision was the third serious train crash in less than two months. Crashes in New York and California in February killed a total of seven people and injured 30.
The Federal Railroad Administration is interviewing witnesses and reviewing onboard recorders as part of its investigation.
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Drew reported from Halifax and Biesecker from Raleigh, North Carolina. Contributors include Martha Waggoner in Raleigh and Mitch Weiss in Charlotte, North Carolina.
Question, was this load permitted by the DOT to navigate this route? IF NOT, then this driver has a big problem. IF YES, then the DOT has a really big problem. I CAN TELL YOU THIS, that rig bottomed out on those tracks. You cannot negotiate tracks at an angle. Trucking 101.
This load was a monster load with a monster weight. A problem from the get go. This driver planned this route, not giving enough respect to the track crossing.
FYI. These heavy haul guys rake in $350,000 a year….
John Devin Black , @ least his name sounds American . Maybe a lack of experience ? I was told by someone years ago if you are ever in a situation like this, if possible find a piece of metal long enough to cover both rails . This should alert any oncoming trains .I have not tested this theory .
the metal long enough to cover both rails ended up being the trailer, dont think that works
The load was under police escprt. They are payed toescort. Iyou know the laws on escorting. The escort Co. In this case the police are responsable for the acident. That is the law in America. So artical should read police ingure 50 or more thew incopitince!!! Not truck driver. Why they payed for the police escort. Why the police should have known what they were doing!!
I agree
but you know they will not take the responsibility unless forced to
the truck driver better hope there isnt some fine print on the back of the permit .. you know how the government will save its own a$$ even if they were dead wrong