Racing train

[mike001]

Did anybody read about the woman who was trying to beat a train with her two kids in the car...the train hit her car and the two kids were killed. My girlfriend sent me this article, it's from last week I think. Who in their right mind would try to race with a train with two little kids in the car, let alone putting herself in danger.Didn't say if she was drunk, drugged or just plain nutty.

[Catty1]

http://www.wishtv.com/Global/story.a...56095&nav=0Ra7

This Fox link has a surveillance video - shot from a distance. You have to wonder how a) stupid, or b) desperate she was. http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,296428,00.htmlEdie Bolanos

Mother Dies Days After Children Killed in Van-Train Crash

Sep 11, 2007 10:50 AM

HAMMOND, Ind. - A Hammond woman has died more than a week after being ejected from her minivan when it crashed into a train as she tried to beat it across the track, killing her two children.

The Cook County medical examiner's office says 32-year-old Edie Bolanos died early Tuesday at Loyola Hospital in suburban Chicago.

Her 11-year-old and 8-year-old daughters were ejected from the van and died from massive internal injuries.

The crash happened Sept. 1 at a CSX railroad crossing in Hammond.

Surveillance video shows the blue minivan racing through a parking lot trying to beat an eastbound freight train through the crossing, only to be hit by a westbound engine and then the eastbound train.

(Copyright 2007 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.)

[Lady's Human]

That happens all over the world, and far more frequently than most people are aware.

In Oklahoma they run Public Service ads about it, and occasionally you hear them in NY as well.

[Catty1]

LH - do you mean the murder-suicide situation?

Considering the date...I wonder if she lost someone in the Towers...

But to take your kids with you....the boys survived, as one was in a car seat and the other in a seat belt (but was still thrown from the vehicle).

[Lady's Human]

No, the idiocy of trying to beat a train to a crossing. It happens all too often.

[Laura's Babies]

They had a rash of those in a nearby parish here, every week somebody was getting killed trying to outrun a train for about a month. That is so sad!

[dukedogsmom]

Goes to show just how stupid people can be.

[DJFyrewolf36]

Unfortuneatly, it happens a LOT here. Many people mistakenly think trains go slowly and they don't realize that they can't beat the train. Cargo trains are huge and people don't like waiting up to 20 minutes for a train to go by so they try to beat it.

[crow_noir]

I'm surprised it doesn't happen more often in my area. We have train tracks EVERYWHERE.

A past time of the teens used to be train boarding. You know... running and jumping onto a train when it's moving.

And you DO have a LOT of idiots that try to outrun the trains or pass through the gates before the train comes.

[moosmom]

Crow Noir,

When I lived in Michigan, I DREADED the trains. You'd sit at a crossing for 10-15 minutes while they SLOWLY went by. The first time I encountered a train, I actually counted the cars. The most I had ever seen was 75 cars!!

Lady's Human is right. It happens all too often and it's sad.

That woman wasn't hit by the train she was avoiding, it was the train on the OTHER side that hit her. What in the world was she thinking???

[lady_zana]

I don't drive so I typically take a cab home. Yesterday we had to wait for a train but we missed the beginning of it....my driver told me if he had seen the beginning and had been able to count the engines he could have told me how long it was going to be....three engines meant it could be around a mile and a half long!

I understand no one wants to wait for a train, especially if it's going to be 1 1/2 miles long and I get frustrated too waiting but I would rather be annoyed or ten minutes (or even more) late for work or class than try to beat a train. And yet, the people on here saying how often it happens are right: every day people try to beat the train coming through.....very sad and yet very stupid too, risking your life because of impatiance.

[G535]

They're not only risking their own lives but also the lives of their passengers, the train crew and the train passengers. We had one bad "accident" down here in June where eleven people lost their lives when a truck ran into a passenger train at a level crossing, one a very good friend of mine. I take photos of trains for a rail magazine and I have seen some really stupid behaviour around crossings and rail lines. One photo can't be published because of legal issues but it is of a young woman who just ducked her head and ran across the line in front of a moving train, she didn't want to be late for work!

[mike001]

I didn't follow the story because it disgusted me so much. I didn't realize the mother had died. Sheer lunacy to try to beat a train, what are those people thinking? If they don't value their lives they shouldn't kill or endanger others along with themselves. Still boggles my mind that someone would be so stupid.

[Catty1]

G535

she didn't want to be late for work!

Literally....better late than NEVER. I tell myself that when I am in too much of a hurry.

But I never have - and would never try to - race a train.

[mike001]

I would rather be late for an appt. than try to beat a train. What's another 5 minutes wait in exchange for living.