(The following article by Rick Rousos was posted on the Lakeland Ledger website on November 30.)
RICHLAND, Fla. — Two CSX cargo trains crashed head-on in the early morning fog Monday, killing the conductor of one train and injuring three other CSX employees, including a conductor from Bartow.
C.J. Jones, 28, a conductor from Carol City in South Florida, was killed in the 2:30 a.m. crash in Richland, east of Zephyrhills and about five miles west of North Polk County.
A total of 16 cars derailed, 15 on a southbound train and one on a northbound.
The crash damaged two tank cars carrying liquid nitrate fertilizer, and about 30,000 gallons of the chemical leaked mostly into a nearby ditch. CSX spokesman Gary Sease said crews had recovered 20,000 gallons of the fertilizer by late Monday.
State regulators inspected and tested soil in the area to gauge the damage and determine whether any of the liquid had seeped into groundwater. While train derailments are not unusual, “a head-on collision is extremely rare,” Sease said.
E.E. Anderson, the engineer in the northbound locomotive carrying Jones, the man who died, was treated and released from the East Pasco Medical Center. Anderson also lives in the Carol City area.
W.E. Taylor of Bartow, the conductor in the southbound train, was treated and released from East Pasco Medical Center, as was the engineer, G.M. Whitehead of Lake Butler. The ages of the three workers who were hurt were unavailable.
Cargo train engineers are similar to airplane pilots and control the speed, brakes and horn of the train. Conductors do not drive the trains but act as co-pilots, lending an second set of eyes. A conductor’s main duty is to oversee the pickup and delivery of freight.
The northbound train, en route to Wildwood from Miami, was headed by two locomotives pulling 60 cars of rock used in construction.
The southbound train, traveling from Georgia to Mulberry and Tampa, was headed by two locomotives pulling 136 cars filled with a variety of goods.
That train was traveling at 28 mph. Sease said railroad officials had not determined how fast the northbound train was going. The speed limit for trains along the stretch of track where the crash took place is 50 mph, he said.
The trains collided on a main section of track, immediately south of a 9,700 foot sidetrack that runs alongside the main track. A sidetrack is used to avert such head-on crashes and also allows slower trains to pull aside and allow faster trains heading in the same direction to pass.
Sease said he could not speculate on the cause of the collision. The possible causes are numerous, including engineer error, the failure or malfunction of large elevated signal lights visible to engineers or vandalism to the switching mechanisms or the track.
In addition to the signals, engineers rely on radio talk, which usually alerts them when another train is in the area.
It was unclear whether fog played a role in the accident. But people living nearby said Monday morning was extremely foggy.
The National Transportation Safety Board will investigate the crash.
Joan Payne, who lives on Melrose Avenue — close to the collision — said she woke up in the middle of the night to a loud noise, but didn’t know what had happened and went back to sleep.
“There’s a lot of trains here, and you hear a lot of noise,” she said.
Officials said about 25 trains per day use the section of tracks at Richland.
The liquid nitrate fertilizer that spilled was intended for agricultural use.
Tim Neal, an on-scene coordinator for the federal Environmental Protection Agency, said federal and state environmental officials are testing all around the crash scene for hazardous materials and possible damage to groundwater.
Neal said that in addition to the liquid fertilizer, a good deal of train fuel leaked because of the crash.
Workers with cranes and bulldozers were expected to continue the job of untangling and clearing the wreckage on a 24-hour basis. The track remained closed Monday evening, and trains scheduled to pass through Richland were being detoured through Orlando.
Reporters and photographers were kept a distance from the crash scene, and Sease would not say whether any of the track was damaged. But a flatbed truck loaded with new track made its way toward the site of the collision.
Included on the southbound train was a car filled with beer. Sease, the CSX spokesman, said he couldn’t divulge the brand. But Pasco County deputies said it was Coors.