Railroaders' Nostalgia > passengers left behind...but the crew??

A recent post discusses the passengers who occasionally get left behind at stations by Amtrak trains - mostly because they  stayed too long at the snack bar in the depot, or wherever.  That reminded me of a happening in my days in the 60's while working on the SP in California.  I may have related this tale before and if I have, well, I repeat myself.

I was working as the TBM (train baggage man) on SP's train 52, the San Joaquin daylight.  The train left Oakland about 730am, and moseyed around the San Francisco/San Pablo Bay, thru Martinez, Pittsburg, Tracy, and over to Lathrop, where it connected with the Sacramento daylight, a connection from Sacramento.  While the articulated coach from Sacramento was being added to the train, I told the head brakeman of our train that I would like to step down from my baggage cars at Merced, about 1100am, and scurry back to the diner car for a bite to eat  between Merced and Madera, a 43 minute gap.  He told me he would watch for me at Merced.  A couple hours later, I handed the mail and baggage for Merced to the station man, pulled the sliding doors of the baggage car together, and latched the chain, then hopped down off the baggage truck, and looked toward the head brakeman about 3 cars, or 250 feet away.  I gave him a signal to pick me up.  He nodded his head.  I started walking back toward the first coach.  A little side note here:  between my baggage cars and the coaches was the RPO (Railway Post Office) car, staffed by postal employees sorting mail as the train rolled along.  Some of the RPO foremen didn't mind if I walked thru the car to go eat, but the foreman this day was a one hundred percenter, who wouldn't even let me come in for coffee.That's why I had to detrain to get back to the diner.
Back to the little story....As I walked quickly back toward the coaches, I heard the 2 or 3 F-7"s powering our train load  up.  Not to worry.  Even though the train is beginning to move, I can still swing aboard at the vestibule passes me, right?  My heart sank a bit as I saw the vestibule door close about 100 feet from me.  Oh nuts!  This is bad!
The upper dutch closed too, so I could not yell at the head brakeman.  The train was accelerating quite well from the station now.  I was sure I was going to have to tell the trainmaster how I missed my own train at Merced!  Would he have laughed or fired me?
Fortunately, the rear brakeman, a young fellow like myself, was still on the rear platform of the coach as it whipped by me picking up speed.  I yelled at him, and, amazingly, he knew how to stop the train by signalling on the communication line.  The train stopped about a 2000 feet down the main line.  The station baggage man gave me a ride to the rear of the train in his car.  As I boarded the rear of the last coach, the head brakeman met me with a sheepish grin on his face, saying he just forgot.  For a long time, I wondered what the reaction would have been if I had actually missed the train I was working on!


TIOGA PASS 
 
 

Norman Orfall
Helendale, CA
TIOGA PASS, a private railcar



Edited 4 time(s). Last edit at 05/29/16 17:18 by aronco.

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aronco, how far did you worked as TBM (train baggageman) to on the old San Joaquin Daylight, train 52? Fresno, CA? All train crews to Fresno?
 

TBM worked the entire distance.Both ways! Train left L.A. in the later years at 5:40am. You hardly got your rest.
Between Moave and Bakersfield you could catch a few winks.

TBM's are not subject to the hours of service act, and had some amazing long runs, such as LA to Oakland, LA to San Jose, Oakland to Ogden, and Oakland to 
K Falls, I believe.  These run thru jobs were prorated between all the seniority districts involved ( there were 5 districts between LA and Oakland). I recall that, in the spring of 1967 ( yes, that seems a long time ago!) I left LA on train 51, the San Joaquin Daylight, at 540am.  This was very wet year for California, the LA River was running nearly full, but we plugged along losing time steadily due to signal troubles and flooding, and by Mojave, we were about three hours late.  Over Tehachapi Pass was steady but slower, until we reached Caliente.  We pulled into the siding and sat.  Apparently, just ahead at Bena, Caliente Creek was attacking the  bridge and the issue was in doubt.  Sometime in the evening, the train crew was relieved, and the few passengers aboard were transferred to busses, but the poor but brave baggageman and the RPO employees were forgotten.  Late the next afternoon, we slowly crept down to the bridge, crossed it, and moved on to Bakersfield, and them up the Valley but without passengers.
Now the 26 hours at Caliente were not all bad.  Santa Fe train 1, The San Francisco Chief,waited alongside us, and that train had a diner!!!  It didn't take long to conjure up some right fine food in that diner, which was a huge step up from the Automat on our train.  First class mail pouches make a fine bunk if placed next to the steam heaters in baggage cars.  All was well in the world while I waited.
Very early the third morning, we were told at Modesto that there was severe flooding near Antioch and Port Chicago, and that our train, which by now had lost all hope and identity would run up to Sacramento and then West to Oakland.  We arrived Oakland about 700pm my third day on the train.  What a trip!  

TIOGA PASS 

Norman Orfall
Helendale, CA
TIOGA PASS, a private railcar



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 05/29/16 17:16 by aronco.

In 1970, I was riding a Union Pacific passenger extra with the Pacific Railroad Society. We were stopped at the Riverside, CA station when, for some unknown reason, the brakeman got off the train while we were stopped. Not knowing the reason, the conductor also got off the train to see why the brakeman left the train. Then the engineer departed for San Bernardino. Perhaps he mistook some hand signal by a railfan but a train order was issued that read as follows:

To the engineer of the UP passenger extra-

Please wait 15 minutes in San Bernardino account you left the conductor and brakeman in Riverside. They are arriving by taxi cab.

Another railfan managed to get the train order later during the excursion but showed it to me.

Jeff Geldner
Sequoia National Park,
California

I've seen some classics at Fullerton with the pedestrian bridge. Most common is people assume if they are in sight of the conductor while the train is stopped at the station, the train will wait for them. Some then decide to take the elevator and not the stairs. 50/50 chance the elevator is at the bottom of the bridge when they press the button from the top, either way the elevator is really slow. Once that elevator door closes with these people inside, "Highball!"

With Metrolink it's a certainty they wait for no one. Amtrak can be a little more forgiving due to the baggage situation, but not all the time.

The look of shock when those people exit the elevator to a train doing about 15 MPH with all the doors shut does make me giggle. I know, it's evil, but they shouldn't take their sweet time getting to the train.

Posted from iPhone

http://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?11,2350325,2350325#msg-2350325

TAW

A few years ago, I boarded one of the San Joaquins in Stockton to return to the Bay Area. I went to the snackbar to get a beer but there was no attendant but instead hand written sign sign on a sheet of note book paper that said "Closed."
I asked a member of the crew what was going on but he equivocated. Finally, another passenger told me the attendant got off at a station down the line (Merced, Fresno?) for a smoke and got left behind. Apparently he had the keys so no one could lock up for him.

DRGW5502 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I've seen some classics at Fullerton with the
> pedestrian bridge. Most common is people assume
> if they are in sight of the conductor while the
> train is stopped at the station, the train will
> wait for them. Some then decide to take the
> elevator and not the stairs. 50/50 chance the
> elevator is at the bottom of the bridge when they
> press the button from the top, either way the
> elevator is really slow. Once that elevator door
> closes with these people inside, "Highball!"
>
> With Metrolink it's a certainty they wait for no
> one. Amtrak can be a little more forgiving due to
> the baggage situation, but not all the time.
>
> The look of shock when those people exit the
> elevator to a train doing about 15 MPH with all
> the doors shut does make me giggle. I know, it's
> evil, but they shouldn't take their sweet time
> getting to the train.
>
> Posted from iPhone

A young fellow with a cup of Starbucks coffee tried sprinting to our train @ Santa Ana, CA. today. He needed to go up outside stairs to cross the tracks to the platform. I hope he enjoyed his coffee waiting for the next train. The kid just didn't get it.

I (nearly) got left in Matinez years ago. I was the LSA on a Westbound Capitol Corridor train back in the Horizon Car days (1991-96?). I needed to go into the station for change and gave the conductor a "heads up" to keep an eye out, but I'd be sure to let him know I was back on board. In those days the conductor would give the MTZ agent a head count for the connecting San Fracisco bus, and so he acknowledged I'd be stepping off, and asked me to relay the bus count for him.
Inside the station I was waiting on a couple rolls of quarters when, sure enough, my train whistles off and begins moving. The agent shows up with my quarters in a full panic- "They're leaving you!!"
I strolled out the door and made eye contact with the conductor on the rear end just as he cleared the platform...
I saw him grab his pack set and they got stopped about 200-300' out.
I climbed aboard as he laid into
Me in a full tirade about how he was going to have me reprimanded for holding up HIS train etc etc...

So I walked him through my hearing:
My 1st witness would be the MTZ agent.
My 1st question would be "What was the bus count?".

My 2nd question would be, "Who gave you that count?".

"Need I go further, or can you work out where this is going?"

He worked it out, and left me alone after that.
SR