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First I would like to request prayers for all who are impacted by this tragedy. I hestitated posting this in the prayer request thread because I need some help.
The young man in this story was married to my best friend's daughter; they had a daughter who's about 4 now, but are divorced. The divorce was difficult, however, throughout the process and after the young man, Bryan, maintained a relationship with his daughter visiting every other weekend in Seguin at my friend's home there. Considering he lived in the DFW area that is commendable. He had remarried only a month before this happened and his wife remains in the hospital. My friend alluded that the train which struck them had a clear sight of the couple for quite a long distance as it is a straight track, but didn't stop and that is one of the reasons I posted here. Is any one familiar with the area and geography of the lake and trestle where this happened. The "A "train has had several incidents according to my friend and the article.

http://dfw.cbslocal.com/2012/02/26/coup ... dentified/

ETA: Human nature is to try to assess blame, but that is not my intent. Walking on any railroad track especially a trestle is not wise. I also ponder why they didn't choose to jump, maybe rocks below????

Puma Guy,

I can help a little here. I will state first, that I do not work for the Denton A Train but I am a Locomotive Engineer with an unrelated company and do not know anything of this specific incident but can shed some light on the subject.

The visibility on the Lewisville Bridge is fair to good depending on the trains direction of travel. However, keep in mind that this is a train that we are talking about and not a Honda Civic. I have had my own train vs. pedestrian incident and can tell with absolutely no doubt that the crew would have done everything in their power to stop that train (no engineer or conductor wants to live with that on their conciseness but its not that simple. Once the engineer sees a pedestrian, his first reaction is to put the train into an emergency brake application. Now everything is out of the hands of the engineer and the result is now controlled by many other factors. (weight, weather, adhesion, ect) but once he has placed the train "into emergency", he has literally done all he can do.

I cant speak to the way passenger trains handle but I can tell you an 18000 ton coal train traveling 55 then placed in emergency can still travel a mile or more depending on these factors.

Best practice is to simply stay off and away from the tracks. Bridges especially.

Drjfiremedic wrote:Puma Guy,

I can help a little here. I will state first, that I do not work for the Denton A Train but I am a Locomotive Engineer with an unrelated company and do not know anything of this specific incident but can shed some light on the subject.

The visibility on the Lewisville Bridge is fair to good depending on the trains direction of travel. However, keep in mind that this is a train that we are talking about and not a Honda Civic. I have had my own train vs. pedestrian incident and can tell with absolutely no doubt that the crew would have done everything in their power to stop that train (no engineer or conductor wants to live with that on their conciseness but its not that simple. Once the engineer sees a pedestrian, his first reaction is to put the train into an emergency brake application. Now everything is out of the hands of the engineer and the result is now controlled by many other factors. (weight, weather, adhesion, ect) but once he has placed the train "into emergency", he has literally done all he can do.

I cant speak to the way passenger trains handle but I can tell you an 18000 ton coal train traveling 55 then placed in emergency can still travel a mile or more depending on these factors.

Best practice is to simply stay off and away from the tracks. Bridges especially.

Thanks. I know a train takes a very long distance to stop. I didn't mean to assert the crew/engineer didn't react appropriately. My friend's comments did allude that and in my post I was merely stating what he said. Due to the circumstances I didn't query as to why they wouldn't have jumped or why they would be on a trestle in the first place. I have since found what I think is the location on Google and it looks like a fairly straight piece of track paralleling I35.

I'm literally at a loss for words for this prayer request...