(The following article by Shelly Whitehead was posted on the Kentucky Post’s website on June 19.)
BOONE COUNTY, Ky. — Though Northern Kentucky is experiencing one of its worst years for train crash fatalities — five have died locally in less than two months — nationally the number of such fatalities hit an all-time low last year.
The Federal Railroad Administration reports that preliminary data from 2002 shows 355 people died in car-train crashes last year, the fewest annual fatalities ever reported and down from the nearly 1,000 deaths reported annually for such accidents in the 1970s.
One of the leading reasons for the steadily decreasing number of deaths at highway rail grade crossings, according to national transportation officials, stems from a nationwide push to close such crossings over the last 10 years.
Federal Railroad Administration spokesman Warren Flatau said that although train and highway traffic has increased since 1993, the number of rail grade crossings has dropped nearly nine percent.
“The federal government, as a policy matter, has encouraged states and localities to close crossings that are redundant and otherwise not so necessary. — You can’t have accidents where there are no crossings,” Flatau said.
“Since 1993, there are 24,000 fewer crossings nationwide. (Now) there are just over 251,000 crossings public and private.”
But even after a landmark year for improvement in rail crossing safety nationally, Flatau said the fact remains that half of all such accidents occur at crossings with working signals and gates which, if heeded, might have prevented death, injury and property damage.
That fact contributes to the growing popularity of organizations like Operation Lifesaver, a non-profit rail safety organization which works with police, schools and community organizations to educate the public about the dangers trains and railroads pose and how to stay safe.
The non-profit national agency educates the public about how quickly even slow-moving trains can reach crossings and how deadly they can be.
It also provides information about what to do when, as appears to have been the case at the Maher Road crossing Tuesday, a car stalls on the tracks.
“Operation Lifesaver, in their safety tips, advises people to get as far from the tracks as possible,” Flatau said.
“Then they should be moving in the direction the train is going so they won’t get hit by debris from the crash. — Then at crossings across the country, you’ll see a crossing number with six digits (and) one alpha letter — along usually with an 800 (phone) number.
“Use that to call the railroad and the railroads will call the train.”
The Maher Road crossing has that information posted on its crossing light signs.
It’s likely, however, that the Nadlers would not have been able to prevent the train Tuesday from hitting their disabled car.
Flatau said it was a horrible panic-inducing situation that left little time for long-thought-out decision-making with three small children seated inside a stalled two-door car.