A Lifetime of Luck Used Up in One Incident

I’m constantly amazed at all the stories about cars and trucks getting hit by trains at grade crossings. There’s one of these incidents almost every day, most involve fatalities, and every single one is avoidable, with booze or stupidity to blame. Or both. Take a look at this photo. The woman driving this car apparently got halfway across the tracks and tried to turn around!

News stories don’t make it clear, why she didn’t continue across when she realized a train was coming, but trying to turn around was a big mistake. Her tires got stuck inside the rails and she wasn’t able to get the car off the tracks.

Luckily, she had enough sense to bail out before the Amtrak train struck her car. And a good thing, too, because it burst into flames at the impact and, according to the emergency crews, was shoved some 300 feet down the tracks before the whole ugly mess came to a stop.

As you can see, the fire blackened the front of the locomotive. Luckily (again), the engine’s fuel tank, which contains 2-3,000 gallons of diesel fuel, did not ignite.

This accident occurred in the town of Chelsea, Michigan, which is about 15 miles west of Ann Arbor.