(San Francisco television station CBS 5 posted the following article on its website on October 19.)
PAJARO, Calif. — Authorities are investigating what went wrong at a Union Pacific Railroad yard in Pajaro last week when freewheeling train cars amputated the legs of a brakeman.
Darrell Thompson, 49, of Santa Cruz, died Friday at the Salinas Road switching station where he and a co-worker moved locomotives and train cars to destination yards. The co-worker found Thompson, who had worked for the Union Pacific Railroad for about three years, lying between cars with his legs severed around 9:20 a.m.
The co-worker told investigators he did not see how Thompson became entangled between the cars. Thompson died at the scene.
National Transportation Safety Board Investigator Mike Flanigon said today he and numerous other agencies’ investigators are interviewing co-workers, reviewing employee histories and testing railroad equipment, like the locomotive’s remote control, to determine how and why Thompson ended up underneath the cars.
“We haven’t identified anyone who actually saw the individual become entangled and fall,” Flanigon said, adding that foul play is not suspected. “The cars were freewheeling and somehow he was struck and fell and somehow he got under the cars. We don’t know exactly how or why.”
Investigators do know that Thompson’s co-worker, a conductor, kicked loose three cars attached to a locomotive to send them freewheeling into a destination yard between 300 and 500 feet away, Flanigon said. Once the cars are separated from the locomotive, which is managed by small control boxes carried by both the conductor and the brakeman, the cars are rolling freely at about 5-10 mph and cannot be controlled remotely, Flanigon said.
The locomotive, however, had its emergency brakes activated by Thompson’s control pack and Flanigon said investigators think that “had something to do with the accident.”
Flanigon said that if a piece of railroad equipment used is deemed defective, the employer could face fines and other penalties from the Federal Railroad Administration. The National Transportation Safety Board, meanwhile, would issue recommendations to the company and the regulatory agency on possible changes in operations.