Eastern Railroad Discussion > Conductor missing?

While switching at Lordstown tonite the conductor of Q640 has gone missing. Local police and CSX officials are looking about the train but as of yet no luck. I do not knoe the individual but lets pray for his safe return.

CR6079 Wrote:
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> While switching at Lordstown tonite the conductor
> of Q640 has gone missing. Local police and CSX
> officials are looking about the train but as of
> yet no luck. I do not knoe the individual but lets
> pray for his safe return.

Strange, I hope the guy turns up OK. I was up near Beaver Falls this evening and picked up a bit of "skip" of the AT dispatcher talking to a passing train about this. I wondered what was up...
Crossing my fingers...
-Alex

Where is Lordstown?

Z Wrote:
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> Where is Lordstown?
Ohio

I've switched at Lordstown dozens of times, and at all hours...it is well far enough outside the city setting of Youngstown, and I'd consider it to be a very safe area. It is quite isolated from anything other than railroading and industry.

Hoping this turns out OK,

Tom in Cumberland

What's the big deal? Most other professions have their share of never-come-back-from-lunch "walk-off's" too.

Crack? There's a difference between a banker walking away from his job during a lunch break versus a railroad conductor. If I was going to leave the railroad, I knew doing so like that would cause a lot of unwanted headaches.

No there isnt. Anyone who leaves their job is an abruptive manner isnt gonna care how disruptive their actions might be. Could be he didn't like some unsafe procedure his engineer kept attempting. Who knows. But with the sheer number of cell phones in the hands of TY&E which are seen in most of my current day photographs, its not out of the realm that he called somebody to pick him up at such-n-such location or road crossing.

This is all just speculation, of course at this point. Sure it could have been a "walk-off", and that would be plenty easy to do. I'd have to say, though, that a walk-off from the fryers at McDonalds is far less serious than a Conductor going missing. On the RR, this sends up all the fears of finding someone injured (or worse) due to the nature of the job. If the guy was not satisfied with the RR, he's not really proving anything by making other railroaders worry about him and getting the local police involved. Who knows - we'll just have to wait till the facts come in...but all I'm saying is that this seems very unusual, as opposed to the "go sweep the parking lot and drive away" quit. But I do hope that's all it ends up being.

Yes he was found at Eastwood Mall in Niles, Ohio safe and sound, atleast he is alive, I know crews were worried he had been run over by the train. Railroad was a mess for awhile, I could hear what was going on and it was interesting conversation for quite awhile.........and yes he is OUT OF SERVICE!

He should also be out of a job, unless he can provide some serious extenuating circumstances.

BaltoJoey

Had a friend in TV news do this. He was a short timer, moving to another city in a few months. The boss started giving him a hard time, wanting him to skip his already delayed lunch. He had the photographer stop the van so he could get out and call a cab. By the time the wheels figured out what was going home he had already changed the message on the answering machine to reflect his new work status. (He offered to donate his last pay check to buy booze for the general manager, a heavy duty drunk.)

SLR62 Wrote:
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> Crack? There's a difference between a banker
> walking away from his job during a lunch break
> versus a railroad conductor. If I was going to
> leave the railroad, I knew doing so like that
> would cause a lot of unwanted headaches.

Sounds like deja-vu all over again, last night 10 new hires walked
out on the second shift at my place of employment, an appliance factory.

The conductor in question may fall into the 'fed up' category,
I believe. The CR/CSX terminal I worked at had a few maifestations of
these actions, mostly due to unpaid claims (not being paid for work
performed). I worked with people who racked up a lot of hours and
saw their next paycheck come to $20.00 (twenty dollars).

Everybody has a limit as to how much BS they can stand. That was the
reason for the above mentioned factory walk out, this particular line
has a very subjective management team, closely mirrored by the hourly
group leaders assigned there.

FEC2000 Wrote:
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>.........and yes he is OUT OF
> SERVICE!

Something tells me that he isnt concerned with that.... This is actually a far more common occurance then one would beleve

There is more to this story than you will ever know, or need to know. BaltoJoey, when did you become a trainmaster? Or perfect? Or all knowing?
He is safe, and we are glad that he is.

reslivka Wrote:
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> There is more to this story than you will ever
> know, or need to know. BaltoJoey, when did you
> become a trainmaster? Or perfect? Or all
> knowing?
> He is safe, and we are glad that he is.

I never claimed to be a trainmaster, perfect or all knowing. Also, I AM glad that he is alive and well. He should have had the decency to at least tell someone what he was going to do. Rather than cause people to start worrying.

If I were to simply walk away from my job, for no valid reason, I would expect to be terminated immediately. I will stand by original comment.

BaltoJoey

I heard this guy derailed 13 cars somewhere between Parma and Sterling because he tied on to cars in wrong track and started shoving thinking he was in the track he was told to go in. The cars shoved out the other end going thus going on the ground. Then he freaked out, got scared and started walking home. I also heard this is a newly promoted conductor. If this is the case, there are a few things that really need to be addressed. One- the CSX training program. It has been said before about more training is needed for new hires. Even though walking away from a derailment is not the way to handle it, but I would be scared as hell too if I derailed cars not having been on the job to long. Two- was there a good job briefing before the work started? I know if I have a new conductor, I always tell them to repeat the yarding info. and the tracks to be used back to me to make sure we are on both the same page.
I think pulling this guy out of service does not solve the problem of "unfinished training". If they let him back to work, they should place him back in training for at least another 6 months. Either way training should be for at least a year.
Some of you are probably wondering why I didn't say to just get rid him? Because I know of a few times CSX has let people back to work for getting drunk at an away from home term. getting called for work and not showing up. Either drunk in the room or fearing getting pulled from service, they found their way back home. CSX gave these people more than a second chance because it happened more than once. I know this it two different situations but CSX let these people that were drunk back to work and they were not new hires. I think they should let the new hire back to work. Just my opinion!

He would not have fired for derailing the cars, esp. if it was his first incident. Probably would have been paid $250 to come to an Incident Review Committee or something, plus more training. After that, 15 days if he did something similar.

Sounds like this guy would have done this at any job he was on, not just the railroad, and I would bet he has walked out before. However, there is a lot of bad info getting circulated among the new hires that also can contribute to such a course of action.

I agree that there is only so much BS one can take. I left my job because of the BS that I was being forced to put up with. $7.05 an hour was not enough money have have 4 co-workers stand around doing nothing while the manager was yelling at me daily for my job performance. At least when I told my boss to "TAKE THIS JOB AND SHOVE IT" (I actually played him the song, which is a ringtone on my phone when I left) I actually let him know I was done with the BS.

I have no problem with someone walking off the job, provided they tell someone they are doing it. That's the problem I have with this conductor leaving. In an industry with the dangers of the RR industry it can bring everything to a halt because of potential injury/death when someone just leaves the job.

I'm glad he's ok, but I think he should be canned or at least not brought back (resignation) for doing this. I'm sure this incident cost the RR a substantial chunk of money because a)they had to loo for him b) they had to stop everything while they looked for him c) I'm sure at least one crew went dead while they looked for him and the trains were stopped. This required a recrew that otherwise wouldn't have been required.