PALM BEACH, Fla. — Think twice before trying to beat a train.
That is the message of Operation Lifesaver this week, reports WPBFChannel.com.
Tri-Rail, Amtrak, and the West Palm Beach Police Department want to get the message out about safety at railroad crossings.
“When those bells and whistles go off, it’s seven seconds before those gates come down,” Maggie Ferrara of Tri-Rail said. “And then it’s 20 seconds before a train comes.
Last summer, police radioed Tri-Rail with a three-minute warning about a car abandoned on the Forest Hill tracks. But they were too late to stop the train. Luckily, no one was in the car.
Three years ago, an 18-year-old girl was not so fortunate. She was killed when another car pushed the vehicle in which she was riding into the path of an oncoming train.
“It takes a freight train almost a mile before it can come to a complete stop,” Andrea Reitor of Tri-Rail said. “Trains like Tri-Rail, maybe a little less, maybe half of a mile.”
Racing with the train can be deadly. That’s the message Tri-Rail and Amtrak tried to give drivers.
As part of Operation Lifesaver at Okeechobee and Tamarind, police wrote several tickets to drivers Tuesday. One woman was cited after stopping practically on the tracks.
“She was right smack dab there, the front tire was pretty close to (the tracks),” Officer Larry Foreman, of the West Palm Beach Police Department, said. “If that gate would have come down, it would have hit right on her vehicle. It could’ve killed her.”
Between 1999 and 2000, nine people died at railroad crossings in Palm Beach County.