Date: 04/30/2012
Time: Around 07:40 A.M.
Location: North Austin, Texas
Vehicle(s) Involved: Metrorail Train, Ford Taurus
By Ben Wear AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF
"A man was killed and two children were injured Monday morning when a Capital Metro train struck their car at a private rail crossing in North Austin, officials said.
It was the second time in MetroRail's 25 months of operation that a train had hit a vehicle at an intersection with no protective gates.
The southbound MetroRail train hit a white sedan at a dirt and gravel drive just south of Scofield Ridge Parkway about 7:40 a.m., Capital Metro spokeswoman Erica McKewen said.
The drive leads to at least two homes in a wooded area to the west. The car appeared to have been eastbound, heading toward the Loop 1 tollway's southbound frontage road.
The Capital Metro track in that area is a long straightaway running alongside the frontage road. A train approaching from the north would be visible for more than a quarter-mile in clear conditions, as was the case Monday morning.
(removed), 32, was pronounced dead at the scene, Austin police said. Two boys in the car were taken to Dell Children's Medical Center, said James Shamard, chief of staff for Austin/Travis County Emergency Medical Services.
Authorities did not identify the children Monday, nor did they release information on their conditions. Shamard did not know whether the man was the boys' father.
Herzog Transportation Services, which operates MetroRail under a contract with Capital Metro, declined to release the train engineer's name. General Manager Terry Bruner told the American-Statesman an initial review of video and onboard data from the incident showed no error by the engineer, who applied the emergency brake and blew the train's horn in the seconds before the crash.
The engineer is next scheduled to work Friday and is free to do so, Bruner said, if he is ready mentally.
"He did everything he could possibly do," Bruner said. "It's a horrendous day."
None of the 128 people on the train appeared to be injured in the crash, Shamard said.
The private crossing has stop signs and white railroad crossing signs just east and west of the tracks but no arms, bells or flashing lights. That setup is typical of the 12 private crossings along the 32-mile MetroRail line and of private railroad crossings generally. Only two private roads along the track, both leading to a gravel quarry with frequent truck traffic, have crossing arms, McKewen said. Another such road, leading to a church, has warning lights and bells but no gates, she said.
The MetroRail line has 62 public crossings, McKewen said. All of them have crossing gates except Red River Street downtown, which has a traffic light.
About 39 percent of the nation's 240,000 railroad crossings in 2006 were private roads or driveways, according to a 2008 Federal Railroad Administration report. Of those 94,400 private crossings, only about 10 percent had safety gates, lights or other mechanical warning devices, the report said. Almost a quarter had no stop signs or train warnings.
The report said that in 2006, there were 410 collisions and 30 deaths at private railroad crossings.
Authorities could not say Monday whether the man's car was moving at the time of the crash or was stationary on the tracks. Officials also could not say how fast the train was moving, but the train speed limit in that stretch of track is 40 mph, McKewen said.
The train came to a stop about 250 feet south of the private drive, with the badly damaged car still entangled in the train's front bumper.
Capital Metro has required its MetroRail engineers to sound the train's bells at each crossing, public or private, since an incident in March 2011 when a train clipped the rear end of a pickup at a private crossing in Cedar Park, McKewen said. The agency also cut back brush to improve sight lines after that accident, and before residents complained, trains sounded their horns when passing that crossing. No one was injured in that incident.
MetroRail engineers are not required to blow their horns as they approach crossings; the agency and the City of Austin have designated quiet zones, where horns generally are not sounded, including in the area of the crash.
Spc. Jeffrey Hinojosa of Texas' Army National Guard said he was in his car on the frontage road parallel with the tracks when he heard the horn.
"I saw the debris flying, and I thought, ‘Oh, man, the train hit a car,' " he said.
Hinojosa immediately pulled over, he said, and started running toward the scene, calling 911 as he did. He was the first one there, he said."
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