March 17, 1993 Amtrak Silver Star hits gasoline tanker. Amtrak's worst wreck in terms of deaths was the Sept. 22, 1993, derailment outside Mobile, Alabama, when the Sunset Limited plunged off a bridge and caught fire in the pre-dawn hours.. Several minutes later, the Sunset Limited came down the tracks at 70 miles per hour, hit the misplaced tracks and derailed. A string of crashes involving Amtrak trains is rekindling memories for survivors of the passenger service's 1993 tragedy, its deadliest accident ever. 34083, sailed off the end of the bridge and into the bayou. He said the water swirled like a whirlpool in a kitchen sink. Authorities said they did not expect to complete a list of the dead before today. Most Victims Drowned. "As soon as it got daylight, we realized how bad it was," he said. . 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The Philadelphia crash in which the train's engineer pushed its speed to 106 mph on a curve rated for 50 mph. (Lawrence Specker/LSpecker@AL.com ), Twenty-three years after the Sunset Limited crash, there's little to distinguish the bridge over Bayou Canot. The train derailed due to a heat-induced kink in the track. This is a digitized version of an article from The Timess print archive, before the start of online publication in 1996. Like almost everyone, Mike Dopheide, 26, of Omaha, Neb., was asleep. It hit the damaged bridge at speed, with no warning anything was amiss. But it was so foggy you really couldn't see the water.". "And everything went black.". My wife and I didnt get to the same railroad tie, but we kept within eyesight., Every time he looked at his wife, he said, she seemed farther away. The crash occurred at around 1 p.m . The train struck a dump truck at a grade crossing. Twenty-Three years, visitors -- including a first responder and the brother of an engineer who died -- returned to the scene of a deadly rail disaster. The span had been designed to rotate so it could be converted to a swing bridge by adding suitable equipment. But in a last-minute change, he continued on toward Pensacola. Ivory, a Texas oil industry worker who helped save Chancey all those years ago, has a theory. Jim Folsom, who flew over the bayou as smoke and steam rose from the wreckage, said, It was the most terrible sight I have ever witnessed.. Community Rules apply to all content you upload or otherwise submit to this site. He had gotten on in Los Angeles after visiting his sister in Highland Park. ", "It actually angled out away from the track several degrees," Mr. Archer said, "and it gives you the impression that it was literally launched off of the bridge at 70 miles per hour." To preserve these articles as they originally appeared, The Times does not alter, edit or update them. The towboat's pilot, Willie Odom, was not properly trained on how to read his radar and so, due to very poor visibility in heavy fog and his lack of experience, did not realize he was off course. This might have given the Amtrak engineer sufficient time to stop his train or at least reduce its speed in an effort to minimize the accident's severity. The journey would take the boat northward into the Mobile-Tensaw Delta. Forty-seven people died and more than 100 others were hurt. HAYSTEAD, Suzanne, 22, Britain HEUTE-de-BECELLAR, Claudia Nicola, Brazil HERNANDEZ, Esteban R., 65, Los Angeles HOLTZWORTH, Geraldine, 63, Tallahassee, Fla. HOLTZWORTH, William John, 73, Tallahassee, Fla. LEONARD, Mary Ellen, 84, St. Petersburg, Fla. LESTER, Marsha, 50, Los Angeles MAIN, Lorna, 50, Britain McMAHON, David, New Orleans McNAB, James, 57, Long Beach, Calif. McNAB, Janice, 55, Long Beach, Calif. NEWTON, Eric, 44, Kissimmee, Fla. PEARCE, Billie Patricia, 62, Reynoldsville, Pa. POOLE, Dorothy, Tallahassee, Fla. POOLE, Harold, 68, Tallahassee, Fla. POWELL, Olga, Tampa, Fla. QUAINTANCE, Ronald, 44, Jackson, Miss. Around the same time, Willie Odom was piloting the towboat Mauvilla as it pushed six barges away from a wharf in Mobile and up the winding Mobile River. But if you see something that doesn't look right, click here to contact us! Working on a Tug. MOBILE, Ala. In the dark of night, three travelers advanced inexorably toward tragedy. 1993 Amtrak crash survivor relives each new one. The other two were passenger coaches. The rail line confirmed there were injuries to passengers and crew members, but offered no more details. CHANCEY, Mary Jane, 45, Orange Park, Fla. CHANCEY, Geary Lee, 45, Orange Park, Fla. CHILDS, Marianne, 36, Las Vegas CRENSHAW, Lilly Ruth, 63, Tampa, Fla. DIENER, Robert J., 54, San Diego DIXON, Patrick, 78, Apopka, Fla. DIXON, Doris, Apopka, Fla. FURANO, Patricia, 57, Winter Haven, Fla. GALVAN, Sean Scott, 3 months, Bainbridge, Ga. GALVAN, Sheila, 21, Bainbridge, Ga. HALL, Billy Rex, 47, Birmingham, Ala. (engineer) HAMPTON, Penny, 47, Hammond, Ind. Rochelle Cook, 58, and Kim Holsapple, 56, both of DeSoto, Kansas, were identified on Wednesday as being among those killed in the derailment on Monday. GPS guidance systems and improved radar have made it much less likely that a heavy vessel could hit it, and guides of Thursday's Blakeley Explorer tour said that trains have better warning systems as well. Buy newspaper front pages, posters and more. Eight cars on the train, Empire Builder 7/27, which was headed from Chicago to Seattle, derailed just before 4 p.m. local time near Joplin, Montana, according to Amtrak. Suddenly I was bumped on the floor, and you could hear the brakes squealing, he said afterward. By late tonight, crews had rescued 159 passengers and recovered 41 bodies, including those of two crew members, said Ted Lopatkiewicz, a spokesman for the National Transportation Safety Board. On Thursday, Sept. 22, 2016, Tom Russ of Foley finally visited the rail bridge where the 1993 Sunset Limited crash claimed the life of his brother Ernie Russ, an engineer. At 2:45 a.m., the Mauvilla struck a rail bridge. After initial advances, the Iraqi offense was repulsed. Anyone can read what you share. It's particularly true for Chancey, whose parents both died in the crash. The train derailed due to a set of switch points moving under the train. Mr. Archer said that the derailment was reported by a tugboat crew and that he believed the tug was the one that had been pushing the barges. You may occasionally receive promotional content from the Los Angeles Times. Andrew Stabler, the captain, was sleeping as the towboat and barges made their way up the Mobile River. It took a jury less than 90 minutes to find Amtrak engineer Brandon Bostian not guilty of all charges in connection with the May 2015 derailment of Train 188, concluding years of legal twists over the crash that left eight people dead and more than 200 injured. TimesMachine is an exclusive benefit for home delivery and digital subscribers. When the car finally came to rest, Paiz said, Russell pulled out a man who had gotten trapped under a seat. This page was last edited on 21 February 2023, at 02:55. The train derailed due to excessive speed on a curve and collided with an. The boat also lacked a compass and a chart of the waters. (AP) An Amtrak passenger train traveling from Los Angeles to Chicago struck a dump truck Monday in a remote area of Missouri, killing three people and injuring dozens more as rail cars tumbled off the tracks and landed on their sides, officials said. The train collided with a trailer that was falling off a passing. The bayou is too shallow under the trestle, he said, and the bridge supports are not wide enough to accommodate barge traffic. The derailment happened. The train struck a rail protruding from a work train. "The only light was from the fire," Mr. Altosino said, "and it was so hot that I had to splash water on my back to cool off. DOZENS ARE KILLED IN WRECK OF TRAIN IN ALABAMA BAYOU, https://www.nytimes.com/1993/09/23/us/dozens-are-killed-in-wreck-of-train-in-alabama-bayou.html. Just ahead of those two coaches, the charred hulks of two of the train's engines lay on their sides, ground into the bayou's muddy bank. [4], Last edited on 26 February 2023, at 22:15, "Derailment of Amtrak Train NO. CSX officials said the track and trestle had been inspected visually on Sunday and had an intensive annual check in February. Times staff writers Richard E. Meyer and Nora Zamichow in Los Angeles and David G. Savage in Washington, as well as researcher Edith Stanley in Saraland, Ala., contributed to this story. That little boy never fussed or bothered. On the afternoon of September 22, 1906, Atlanta papers report four separate assaults on white women by Black men, none of which are ever substantiated by hard evidence. From there, they were taken to a lumber mill in the nearby town of Chickasaw. The train derailed due to sabotage of the rails. The NTSB said the Sunset Limited got its last clear signal at 2:47 a.m. when it was about three-quarters of a mile from the bridge and traveling at 70 mph. Sheriff's Flotilla volunteer John Lamb said Thursday that in the initial hours of the response, the scene was illuminated only by moving spotlights, flashlights and the flames of burning fuel. It was caused by displacement of a span and deformation of the rails when a tow of heavy barges collided with the rail bridge eight minutes earlier. The accident occurred about 15 miles north of Mobile, where the train had just stopped. The FBI said a tugboat pushing six barges loaded with concrete and coal might have rammed and weakened the trestle shortly before the Sunset Limited arrived. But for those who witnessed the horror of people drowning in rail cars at Big Bayou Canot, everything comes rushing back with every Amtrak disaster. Five other incidents have caused ten or more deaths: a 1987 collision with freight locomotives in Maryland, a 1971 derailment in Illinois, a 1996 collision with a commuter train in Maryland, a 1999 grade crossing accident in Illinois, and a 1977 grade crossing accident in Florida. Website Builders; browsers without safesearch. (AP/KWCH) - Several lawsuits have been filed following the Amtrak train collision and derailment in rural Missouri that killed four people and injured up to 150 others. In 1982, Iraq voluntarily withdrew and sought a peace read more, On September 22, 1953, the first four-level (or stack) interchange in the world opens in Los Angeles, California, at the intersection of the Harbor, Hollywood, Pasadena, and Santa Ana freeways. Perkins said the lead engine's entire undercarriage was sheared off in the crash. For a while, the smell of diesel fuel took him back to the scene of the crash; he figures his work in oil fields where diesel is abundant helped him tamp down the response. Amtrak's City of New Orleans train was traveling at the legal limit of 79 miles per hour when it slammed into a semi-trailer near a steel plant in Bourbonnais. HELENA, Mont. All rights reserved (About Us). Three men, including two close friends who wanted to be among the first to ride Amtrak's new route in Washington, died Monday after the train derailed. . When the Civil War broke out in 1861, read more, Captain Ernest Medina is acquitted of all charges relating to the My Lai Massacre of March 1968. Within two days, three other young men were murdered. In Washington, Amtrak officials said the death toll could equal or exceed all previous fatalities in the 23- year history of the long-distance passenger line. Out of 220 people aboard, 42 passengers and five crew members died; more than 100 more were injured. He was pronounced in good condition at a nearby hospital. The Sunset Limited's locomotives, baggage car and two of six passenger cars had gone. metallurgists were being flown in to determine if the heavy metal barges had played a role in damaging the trestle. A Conrail freight train collided with the Amtrak train. The three locomotives and the first four cars of the train plunged into the water. Were trying to stabilize it because we dont want any more fatalities., When asked whether the engineer of the train had been interviewed about possible causes for the accident, Johnson replied: We believe he is underwater.. "We were throwing sheets and blankets out of the cars that were still on the track to the people who were wet from being in the water," said Edward Mouton, a 20-year-old passenger from Los Angeles. The train struck two CSX workers walking along their train. said the information gathered so far supported the theory that the trestle might have been loosened by being hit by the barges. The train was running about 30 minutes late because of an air conditioning problem that was repaired in New Orleans. Following is a complete list of the 47 people who are known to have died Wednesday in the crash of an Amtrak train near Mobile, Ala. Three people have died and at least 50 injured after an Amtrak Southwest Chief train hit a dump truck at a public crossing and derailed near Mendon, north of Marshall. The toll could eclipse the cumulative total of 48 people killed in all crashes on Amtrak since it was created 23 years ago to run the nations long-distance passenger trains. The Crucial Questions. [1] Following a recommendation to maintain a record of onboard passenger numbers, Amtrak now records passenger lists electronically. Among the first rescuers on the scene were the crews of the tugboats Scott Pride and Mauvilla. On the other side of the trestle was the third engine, which had pulled the train; it, too, was on its side in the mud, charred and mangled. He just thought, Hey, this is a great game! . Others climbed out of the train. On September 22, 1993, an Amtrak train derailed on the CSX Transportation Big Bayou Canot Bridge near Mobile, Alabama, United States. Chancey gets news alerts on her phone, and she's always shaken when another passenger train crashes. Their Amtrak train to Chicago collided with a dump truck at a crossing killing the two women and another passenger who succumbed on Tuesday - 82-year-old Binh Phan, of Kansas City, Missouri. The NTSB's chief investigator, Russ Gober, conceded Friday that confusion exists over the accident reporting times, but he said such time differences are "quite common in accident investigations.". At one point, Watts thought he would die. There was a kid in the water having trouble, Paiz said. MENDON, Mo. Tom Russ said his brother was 43 and making a familiarization run on the Sunset Limited, which was to become his regular route the next weekend. FILE - This Sept. 22, 1993, file photo shows the wreckage of the Amtrak Sunset Limited train, north of Mobile, Ala. A barge hit a railroad bridge and minutes later the train hit the bent tracks and plunged into the bayou, killing 47 people and injuring more than 100 others. The train struck a delivery truck at the grade crossing. "I've been wanting to come up here for 23 years," he said. The crash occurred in a remote area north of downtown Mobile. Mr. Archer of the F.B.I. The one-sided battle, during which 1,400 British sailors lost their lives, alerted the British to the deadly effectiveness of the submarine, read more, Long-standing border disputes and political turmoil in Iran prompt Iraqi President Saddam Hussein to launch an invasion of Irans oil-producing province of Khuzestan. The train was struck by a dump truck at a grade crossing. John Hammerschmidt, a member of the National Transportation Safety Board, also investigating the crash, said scrape marks on the barge seemed to match scrape marks on the trestle. The train derailed on a curve due to excessive speed. 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The agency held a public hearing in Mobile, just miles from the bayou, made multiple recommendations to improve safety, and the world moved on. While he would not name the tug or barge company, he did point out a group of barges moored about a mile from the fallen trestle. The train derailed due to a cracked rail. Another 103 were injured. The bayou is home to snakes and alligators, some say bears as well. "I don't blame him one bit," Chancey said. People shouted at him, he said, asking him to look for medicine and purses. Fire and Fog. It was not known how fast the Sunset Limited was rolling. Too much time has passed, he said. A graduate of Yale University, Hale joined a Connecticut regiment in 1775 and served in the successful siege of read more, On September 22, 1945, Gen. George S. Patton tells reporters that he does not see the need for this denazification thing and compares the controversy over Nazism to a Democratic and Republican election fight. Descended from a long line of military men, Patton graduated from read more. It was, as The Saturday Evening Post wrote, a mad motorists dream: 32 lanes of read more. I thought, This is it. Steve Day, left, and the park's director of excursions, Mike Bunn, explained the scenario leading up to the derailment. An episode of the National Geographic Channel documentary series Seconds From Disaster examined the accident. Its crew members were still inside. Their visit to the Gulf Coast done, the Chanceys board the eastbound Sunset Limited toward home at Biloxi, Mississippi, the night of Sept. 21, 1993. https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/train-derails-in-alabama-swamp. About 40 people on the train when it crashed had boarded in Los Angeles, an Amtrak official said. The Sunset Limited train travels from Los Angeles through Texas to New Orleans before arriving in Miami, Florida. 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