Train Rams Abandoned Vehicle On Railroad Tracks In Monroe Another tale of trusting the GPS April 01, 2017
End result of the train-car confrontation. Photo: Monroe Police. Larger image below
LARGER IMAGE of above. End result of the train-car confrontation. Photo: Monroe Police. CLICK TO ENLARGE
Chronicle staff
(MONROE, WA.) -- Friday evening the ABC News "20-20" program broadcast the story of a young college student who'd gotten herself into a life threatening situation in the dessert near the Grand Canyon.
She had blindly followed her smartphone's GPS instructions into a road that went into the middle of nowhere where she ran out gas and was stuck with no cell signal.
On Friday evening a woman in Monroe learned a similar hard lesson in blindly trusting Google's ubiquitous GPS signal and direction system.
Just before midnight Monroe Police officers were dispatched on a call about a car that appeared to be stuck on the railroad tracks on Kelsey Street just south of State Route 2 in Monroe.
"As the first officer arrived they observed the railroad crossing lights start to flash and the crossing arms begin to lower. The officer ran to check the vehicle to make sure no one was inside and found it to be unoccupied," said a police statement issued Saturday. "The officer then left the tracks as the train was rapidly approaching."
That eastbound train then ran into the car, pushing it about 500 feet down the tracks.
"The driver of the vehicle was contacted. She explained she was on her way to work and was unfamiliar with the area," said the police statement. "The driver said she was following her GPS and turned right as directed, not realizing it was the railroad tracks. She thought that the car was stuck since the front wheel was off the roadway."
The woman told police she tried to back up but the vehicle wouldnt move and she was starting to see smoke. She then left the vehicle and called her husband.
Investigators from Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railway responded to the scene. The stopped train blocked the crossings at Kelsey Street and 179th Ave SE for several hours.
The train cleared the tracks just before 4:00 am, according to police. There were no reported injuries.
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Hmm. That address doesnt look right. It looks like the link pointing here was faulty.
2017 hasn't been BD's best year. Not yet, anyway. But hope springs eternal. Oh wait, that's for baseball teams at the beginning of the season.* Sorry, BD.
Monroe WA on the ex GN/BN now BNSF Scenic Sub mainline between Seattle and Chicago.
It has a 7000ft siding and 4 grade crossings within the 7000ft. Unless your train is short,
most meets at Monroe are "running meets" where usually the westbound train stops east
of town waiting for the "Q" that the eastbound train is close enough to proceed and block
all the crossings in town but still moving. I've witnessed this many times in person and have
a few videos of when it works to perfection. The eastbound AMTK Empire Builder seems to
have running meets at Monroe almost daily. Monroe went from a town of 5K to about 35K in the
last 20 yrs so has traffic. I wish I had an ounce of silver for every time I had to call a signal mtr
to Kelsey Street crossing in Monroe because of knocked off gates or signal malfunctions.
When you have a green signal through Monroe you are doing 50mph.
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If you are in a horror movie, you make bad decisions, its what you do.
