Eastern Railroad Discussion > 20 Years Ago Today They Were Shooting At A CSX Train

2001 - A runaway freight train rolled about 70 miles through Ohio with no one aboard before a railroad employee jumped onto the locomotive and brought it to a stop.

Even made a fictional movie about it called Unstoppable...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CSX_8888_incident

I was dispatching the NS Fostoria District that day. Someone called, it might have been the CSX dispatcher or one of our chiefs, and said there was a runaway coming, to stop NS traffic at North Findlay. Luckily, there wasn't anything close. So I lined a signal for their train to go south, and waited. After it zipped by, back to business as usual.

Dad was working as a yardmaster in Willard, OH when this happened. He said all he heard was some chatter on the radio about a runaway. Other than that, it didn't affect him or his operation.

-Dave

I was working with the local section crew at North Baltimore. Rail gang was laying new rail through town.
Employee in charge was told to make sure no one was working near the diamond at nearby Galetea. Also he was asked if he had any portable derails. I got call on radio to load portable derails on backhoe and head for the first crossing north of the diamond. Had no idea what was going on. Wife calls me and says their is a train out of Toledo out of control with no one on it. Then I find out plan is to derail it in the siding. If it doesn’t derail entering the siding. Didn't derail entering the siding or hitting the portable derail. Although the first axle did derail but rerailed on the road crossing and continued on its way across the diamond. Everyone thought for sure it would never make it across the diamond. Dispatcher never lined it up and runaway ran a red signal causing all kinds of other issues.

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