Western Railroad Discussion > Reverse gate crasher

The gate was doing the crashing in this case.

At Durango CO last Friday

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HA !!! when i was a prepubecent my friends and myself went to the movies in the other end of town in Camden,NJ ... my mother picked us up when the movie was over ... we were 1/2 way home and were approaching the double track rr crossing that is encountered enroute either way ... as we got close the crossing protection activated and my mother being the railroader wife she was would never run thru and try to beat the gate but she was right at the gate when she stopped ... down comes the gate right on the hood of our car ... she starts to panic ... the car behind us is pretty close as the train is blowing for the crossing ... she stays put but is in a full panic ...

the train was on track closer to us which was a 2 mile industrial track ... the train enters the crossing blowing hard with our car in the crossing and the gate on the front hood but not fouling the industrial ... i remember thinking if my pop was on that train he's gonna be fit to be tied if he sees our car like that ... fortunately pop wasn't on the Camden yard runner ... the train passes doing les than the max for restricted speed... the gates start to go up and they get 1/2 way up they start to come down again before my mom hadda chance to even put the car in gear ... a train is blowing and as the yard runner is slowly making it's way west, an empty coal train blasts into the crossing feom the opposite direction doing every bit of the 30mph max authorized speed on the main track of the then Clementon Branch ... my mother in a full panic starts yellin at us for messing around in fhe car



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 07/30/15 07:17 by Out_Of_Service.

A car today end up with a broken window running the gate at Mojave. Train stopped in time and did not hit the car. This was the crossing at highway 14 going from the main to the Lone Pine.
Dennis

Had this incident in Brewster, Ohio, back on March 29th. RJ Corman parked a southbound train near this crossing, but the gates were stuck going up and down every minute or so. I called the number on the crossing box and ended up speaking to someone at the RJC to let them know about the gate issue. But while I was on the phone a pickup truck driver entered the crossing as the gates were starting the go up, then for some reason the gates went back down and one landed on the rear half of the truck. The guy saw the gate go down and hit the gas, and the lawnmower in the bed of the truck snagged the gate and held on until the gate broke off at the joint. No damage to any of the vehicles thankfully, and someone from the RJC fixed the gate the same day. The crew that got on the train later that day still had to flag the crossing, though.

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