WEATHERFORD, Texas — One crew member suffered what were reported to be minor injuries after a Union Pacific train derailed after hitting a truck hauling an oversized load at a grade crossing today (Sunday, Dec. 17), the Fort Worth Star-Telegram reports.
Two engines and 17 cars of the train derailed in the incident about 9:30 a.m.; an image on the KXAS-TV website show multiple double-stack intermodal cars derailed across a roadway. The station reports Parker County Emergency Services said it worked to clear a fuel spill that resulted from the incident, but no other hazardous materials were involved.
The collision occurred at the intersection of Farm to Market Road 5 and Annetta Centerpoint Road in Weatherford, about 23 miles west of downtown Fort Worth.
The Texas Department of Public Safety said the train’s engineer was taken to a hospital with minor injuries. Information on the condition of the truck’s driver was not available.
I travel thru this crossing weekly. No traffic light, railroad is straight for several hundred yards. There is a rise in the track bed. Simply a thing of not enough clearance of the trailer and it high centered. Load was oil fracing equipment unit. Expensive item to say nothing of damage to track and freight cars. Got to wonder if trucker had millions of dollars of liability coverage.
Certainly like everyone else, I don’t have a clue how this was allowed to happen, but I did find a couple of vid’s on YT, one of which is of the actual incident. Although I’m sure it may have been the lowest bidder, I wouldn’t be too quick to blame this on the rate charged for the oversize movement. This would have indeed been an escorted load, and a big enough combination to warrant, if not require scouting the route out. It would be interesting to see the total bill on this one, probably a little more than the limit on the truck’s policy…
Why didn’t they just call UP Dispatch and say that they would be crossing at that location between Y and Z with a load with possible low clearance issues and could they put a 10 mph approach restriction beginning at the horn signal “crossing – X” sign which would require the engineer to reduce speed some distance before that to get down to 10- mph. Then the engineer would be prepared to dump the air if the truck was on the tracks or proceed as before if no truck was in the area. If train movement signals are in the area, they could be set for “STOP” or a solid yellow for “proceed with caution”. As long as the trucking company and the railroad dispatchers are in regular communication, a train should never hit a truck unless the truck driver is just acting foolish and taking chances, which is usually the case…
Looked up site. No surprise: curved pavement before crossing AND a curve in the RR. Of course RR ROW had trees, cut for legal distance, BUT NOT enough for the obstructed view of rubber traffic.
Since there are defined routes (and not to be altered) for permitting some loads, seems the permit/mapping outfit would do something about warning driver or RR
Oh I forgot, cost will always step ahead of safety.
If memory serves me right, this collision like several of the resent ones are occurring at T intersections or intersections immediately across the ROW controlled by traffic lights stopping the traffic. Be interesting to know.
If true this is where the escorts need to get ahead of the rubber load, block the intersection before the truck proceeds to cross, that’s how we always had our loads delivered.. Here a load that width would have probably required police escort which would help but cost.
I have to agree with you Mike and Michael, there is absolutely nothing the crew can do, hopefully they will be alright.
Michael, you’re “dead on point”. As a crew carrier, several suicides, a UP cop told the crew, “That person only saw a Big Machine.” Never to think about this tragedy will affect you two guys for the rest of their lives.
Oversize load permits that have a potential to get stuck need to change their requirements to get track protection from the railroad to cross. But of course government agencies are never held accountable for incompetency.
Again we have another oversize road load struck.
These drivers generally are or were the best of the best to handle these massive rigs, what happened?
Any of these size of loads I was involved with had lead, trailing and even extra escorts to assist. Their job was safety and the extra eyes of the driver since there are so many blind spots.
The load routes were always well planned out and even predriven by the escort company.
Surely the trucking industry knows their responsibility, this shouldn’t be happening.
Sadly, might be the result of “The Price of Low Price”. Unless you’ve ridden in the cab on the head end, and seen what happens on a regular basis in front of the motor, difficult to really understand the trauma experienced by the train crew.
Amen to all of this.