(The Indianapolis Star published the following story by Dan McFeely on its website on September 18.)
INDIANAPOLIS — The whistle blows and CSX Special Agent Dave Case drops his Chevy Blazer into gear.
He cruises northeast on Massachusetts Avenue, staying a few rail-car lengths ahead of the freight train.
Up ahead he spots a blue van, southbound on Sherman Drive, that has snaked about halfway through the railroad crossing gates, intent on beating the train.
“We call that a slalom,” says Case, who illustrates the point by moving his hand like a snake. “They try to slalom their way around the gates.”
He draws closer and reaches to activate his lights and siren. Meanwhile, two staked-out motorcycle officers also poise for action. The van suddenly stops, backs up and does a U-turn as the train roars through the intersection at about 30 mph.
One less ticket to write during Wednesday’s crackdown by CSX, city and state police, a show of force designed to raise awareness of the growing problem of accidents at crossings.
Of all states, Indiana ranked second last year with 174 car-train crashes.
On this day, there were no crashes and few tickets. The driver of the blue van probably felt lucky to avoid the police. He also should feel fortunate that he didn’t become a statistic.
In 2002, car-train crashes killed 17 people and injured 44 in Indiana. Across the nation, 352 were killed and 983 injured as vehicles (or pedestrians) were hit by trains.
More than half of the crashes in Indiana were at crossings that had active warning devices.
“The lights and the gates activate when the train is about 26 seconds away,” said Case, a 13-year veteran railroad cop.
“Once those lights come on, that is the same as a red light. People have to stop.”
Often, they don’t.
Last weekend, a woman talking on a cell phone drove through a lowered gate near 46th Street and Keystone Avenue, shattering it into several pieces.
And Dennis Wall, track supervisor for the Indiana Transportation Museum in Noblesville, said a distracted teenager drove a small pickup into the side of one of their moving trains on 216th Street.
There were no serious injuries in either incident.
“They just have their minds on something else,” said Wall. “They drive by these areas every day, and they never see a train. So they don’t even think about it.”
Special Agent Case gets paid to think about it. His job is to protect CSX trains, employees, property “and probably billions of dollars of our customers’ products.”
There are some incidents he’d rather forget. Like the mangled minivan that held the bodies of a mother and daughter. And last year’s suicidal driver who drove onto tracks, smacking into a train head-on.
When train hits car, the car loses.
The guy in the red convertible who sped through the descending gates at Rural Street on Wednesday was not thinking about that. He was thinking about getting to work on time.
“Well, he wouldn’t even have made it at all if he’d been hit by a train,” said Special Agent Paul McKamey, who showed no mercy toward the first driver pulled over during the crackdown.
About 36 to 40 trains roll through Indianapolis every day on CSX tracks. On any given day, police say, they could catch a lot of people ignoring railroad crossing lights and crossing guards.
But IPD Lt. Mike Bates said the train’s whistle does not always trigger action by local police.
“We probably don’t do as much as we should,” he said. “But right now we’re focused on schools and school buses. We do the best that we can.”
CSX’s Case, who was a Toledo policeman 12 years, understands.
“I didn’t (pay attention) when I was a street cop. It’s hard for local cops to keep it on their radar. They don’t have the schedule, and they’re always busy working disturbances and disputes.”
At the end of the day, the crackdown produced just four citations. But nobody died.
“Not a bad day,” said Case.