The TV News had some video of the cornfield meet. Three trainmen are missing and feared trapped in the locomotives cab. Tragically they probably have died in the wreckage.
That certainly looks like a mess. Thinking back to physics from long ago, must have been a tremendous amount of energy in that collision. Such a sad event.
After seeing the video of it as it was happening, you can clearly see proof of that energy as the cars continue piling in.
This coming via the railfan grapevine: "Eastbound train S-LACLPC1-26 failed to stop at the red signal at the east end of Main 1 at the Panhandle siding where they were to meet the westbound Q-CHISBD6-27."
It looks like straight track where the wreck happened. Didn't the engineers see the train coming at them and big hole the air?
Found this on YouTube today while looking at some other videos. It shows the destruction between the two trains and is painful to watch. * no sound Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
From what I have been told, there is a cross over there right before the point of collision. The west bound train was waiting for the east bound to cross to the other track to go around it. The dispatcher would have told everyone what was going to happen but had not lined the switches yet. The east bound was supposed to stop until the dispatcher had done so but blew on by the red signal. By the time the west bound crew knew what was going on, it was too late and only one crew had time to jump.
It's not out of the question. We are constantly working while fatigued. I've been a conductor for 11 1/2 years. When I hired on the railroad said that they were working on improvements. While some changes have been made in my opinion none have alieviated the fatigue issue.
I was just looking at Google Earth. According to that source there is a crossover, a pair of them in fact, about two miles west of town.