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> Train wreck/hazmat situation in Jackson Twp
Southsider2k12
post Jan 6 2012, 02:39 PM
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Piggybacking off of some some facebook reports plus the NWI Times, a train on train accident has occured in Jackson Township in the area of in the area of County Road 500 East and 600 North. Flames, injuries, and hazmat are all being reported at the scene. It is being reported that Ethanol was being hauled by one of the trains.
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Southsider2k12
post Jan 6 2012, 03:09 PM
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Pictures from the scene

http://abclocal.go.com/wls/gallery?section...459&photo=1
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Southsider2k12
post Jan 6 2012, 03:15 PM
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Video as well

http://abclocal.go.com/wls/video?id=849350...ate&section
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Southsider2k12
post Jan 8 2012, 05:08 PM
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http://www.nwitimes.com/news/local/porter/...77aac2e059.html

QUOTE
ACKSON TOWNSHIP | Federal officials are investigating just what caused three freight trains to crash northeast of Valparaiso, sending a thick cloud of black smoke into the air and forcing residents from their homes.

At 1:18 p.m. Friday, Porter County sheriff's police were called to the area of County Road 600 North and County Road 500 East, where they found the flaming wreckage of three CSX freight trains just north of the intersection.

"They were one on top of each other," Sgt. Larry LaFlower said of the tankers and freight cars the locomotives were hauling.

LaFlower said investigators believe a westbound train was stopped on the tracks for an unknown reason and was rear-ended by a second westbound train. The impact caused both trains to derail, and diesel fuel from the second locomotive reportedly set the wreckage of both trains on fire.

A third train, heading west on the adjacent track, was unable to stop and struck the wreckage, further adding to the fiery mess.

LaFlower said two crew members in the second train suffered nonlife-threatening injuries and were taken to Porter hospital in Valparaiso.

The wreckage sent skyward thick plumes of black smoke that were visible for more than three miles. With some of the toppled tankers known to haul ethanol, police evacuated between 50 and 150 homes in a one-mile radius.

In a statement, CSX Corp. officials said the crash involved three cars with flammable products and a number of empty hazardous materials cars. Friday night, they said no significant hazardous materials leaks or spills were reported and inspections of all loaded and empty hazardous materials cars were being conducted.

"If they had been full, we'd be telling a (different) story," LaFlower said.

A steady stream of tanker trucks rolled to the scene from fire departments throughout Porter, LaPorte and Lake counties, as firefighters poured thousands of gallons of water on the wreckage, dousing the flames.

As the smoke began to subside about 5:30 p.m., semitrailers full of large spotlights and heavy machinery began arriving at the site.

A CSX representative said it's unknown how many cars derailed.

LaFlower said officials with the National Transportation Safety Board and the Federal Railroad Administration will be leading the investigation into what led to the massive wreck.

Read more: http://www.nwitimes.com/news/local/porter/...l#ixzz1iuYByPVm
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Southsider2k12
post Jan 8 2012, 05:10 PM
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http://www.nwitimes.com/news/local/porter/...22b88a6d3a.html

QUOTE
For witnesses, first responders, an unforgettable sight

By Bob Kasarda bob.kasarda@nwi.com, (219) 548-4345 | Posted: Friday, January 6, 2012 6:48 pm

JACKSON TOWNSHIP | Tree contractor Michael Cieply was giving a work estimate Friday afternoon when he heard what sounded like a car crash less than a mile away.

Driving to his Washington Township home, he came upon the flaming wreckage of three freight trains. He fled his truck to see if he could help and saw a man thrown from the train sitting in a field. As the man was being taken away later on a stretcher, he overhead him say he felt as though he was in hell.

"You could feel the heat from the flames," Cieply said.

As Cieply made his way farther into the heavily wooded area and past mangled train cars, he came across a second man from the train in pain and helped escort him to safety.

"It was scary," he said, "You just react."

Jim Sherrick lives about a half-mile from the crash site. Trained as a first responder through the Porter County Emergency Management Agency, Sherrick heard about the crash on his police scanner.

"At first, I thought it was a car-versus-train," he said.

When he got to the scene, he immediately knew it was more.

"It looks like a child got upset with his model train," Sherrick said. "They've got a huge mess to clean up."

Valparaiso resident Bart Anderson said he was biking east along County Road 600 North just before the crash when a westbound train passed him on one of the two tracks involved.

Just a minute or so later, a second westbound train passed him.

"When I saw the second train, I was surprised," he said.

Anderson did not hear the crash, but he saw the results on his return trip while passing over the the bridge on 600 North near County Road 500 East and the tracks.

"I looked over the side of the bridge," he said. "It was a jumble of overturned railroad cars."

Times staff writer Jeff Burton contributed to this story.

Read more: http://www.nwitimes.com/news/local/porter/...l#ixzz1iuYZBtLw
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Southsider2k12
post Jan 8 2012, 05:15 PM
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http://posttrib.suntimes.com/news/porter/9...ake-months.html

quote]Investigators examine train wreck scene, cause could take months

By Amy Lavalley Post-Tribune correspondent January 7, 2012 5:54PM

Crews remove the final cars off the rail lines, Saturday, January 8, 2012, from Friday's three-train collision in Jackson Township. | Michael Gard~For Sun-Times Media

Updated: January 8, 2012 2:01AM


VALPARAISO — Investigators with the National Transportation Safety Board will be on the scene of a three-train wreck near Porter County Roads 600N and 500E for the next three or four days, but it will take nine months to a year before a final report on the crash is complete.

The accident, at 1:18 p.m. Friday between three westbound freight trains, halted traffic on a major east-west artery for CSX. Officials said when the line will reopen is not known; freight traffic has been rerouted because of the wreck.

“We don’t have a conclusive time frame on that. Our first concern is always the safety of the site and the employees,” said Tom Livingston, resident vice president with CSX.

Two westbound trains collided when the first one stopped and a second struck it from behind. A third westbound train on a parallel track then hit the debris from the crash.

Two crew members on the second train who were injured in the accident were treated at Porter hospital and released, said Ted Turpin, investigator in charge with the NTSB, during a media briefing Saturday. Crew members on the other two trains — there were two on each — were not injured.

The NTSB has launched a team from across the country to look into the factors that may have caused the crash, including operations, human factors, signals and mechanical issues. The track is not believed to have been a factor.

“The track can tell you and right now, it had little to do with the accident,” he said.

Investigators are collecting evidence, testing signals, interviewing those involved, and going over records from inspections of the equipment and the signal system, Turpin said.

Officials don’t know the speed the first train was going when it came to a stop, but the third train was going 57 mph. The speed of the second train is not yet known. “We are still looking for the event recorder that will have that information,” Turpin said.

The exact number of train cars that derailed also is not yet known. Contractors worked though the night to clear mangled cars off the track and had removed a portion of the track by Saturday afternoon, though blacked train cars still littered the farm field where the accident occurred.

Some of the wreckage was still smoldering, and heavy vehicle equipment lined County Road 600N, which, with other nearby roads, remains closed to traffic. The Salvation Army provided support services for the wreckage-removal and investigative crews.

“We’re working to open up at least one of the (rail) lines,” Turpin said, adding work was slowed looking for the event recorder from the second train. The two other recorders have been recovered.

Residents within a one-mile radius of the accident were temporarily evacuated Friday because there were ethanol cars on the first train, though Livingston said those cars were empty.

All three of the trains were headed to Chicago. The first, with 77 empty ethanol cars, was from Oak Island, N.J. The second had 60 cars, 24 loaded with general merchandise, and was from Willard, Ohio. The third train, with 48 intermodal carriers, was from Kearney, N.J.

“This line is a key corridor between Chicago and the northeastern United States. It’s an important line,” Livingston said, adding it’s “one of the key freight corridors in the nation.”

The financial tally from the wreck will be part of the final report on the accident from the NTSB, he said.[/quote]
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Southsider2k12
post Jan 9 2012, 08:50 AM
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http://washingtonexaminer.com/news/nation/...llision/2069856

QUOTE
People allowed to return home after derailment
By: TOM COYNE | 01/06/12 4:08 PM

Train wreckage still burns after three trains collided, Friday, Jan. 6, 2012 near Valparaiso, Ind. Three freight trains derailed after a collision in northwest Indiana, officials said Friday, leaving several mangled train cars on their sides along the tracks and black smoke billowing from burning tankers.

An official says dozens of people forced to leave their homes after a three trains derailed in northwest Indiana have been cleared to return home.

Officials had evacuated 50 to 150 homes within about a mile of the crash site near Valparaiso after some of the trains caught fire Friday, raising fears of a possible chemical spill.

Authorities say one of the trains was pulling ethanol tankers, but those were mostly empty.

Porter County Emergency Management Director Phil Griffith said authorities were allowing people back in their homes early Friday night.

Read more at the Washington Examiner: http://washingtonexaminer.com/news/nation/...6#ixzz1iyNNS3D4
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Southsider2k12
post Jan 10 2012, 08:32 PM
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http://posttrib.suntimes.com/news/porter/9...F3uQJ8A.twitter

QUOTE
Train crash responders sickened, likely from food they were served

By Erin Guerra Post-Tribune correspondent January 10, 2012 5:00PM

VALPARAISO — Numerous first-responders to Friday’s three-train crash became violently ill over the weekend, and possibly from an unexpected source: the food.

Chemicals spilled from the freight trains, including ethanol and diesel fuel, the latter which fed fires sending up enough smoke for emergency personnel to evacuate an area one mile to the north and east of the crash site, northeast of Valparaiso near County Roads 600N and 500E.

Porter County Health Department director of nursing Connie Rudd confirmed the department is investigating complaints of fire and police responders getting sick. “It does not appear to be anything that came from the train,” she said.

Sgt. Larry Laflower, spokesman for the Porter County Sheriff’s Department at the crash site and who also was one of the people who got sick, said he knew of many police officers and firefighters who had the same gastronomical symptoms through Monday. He believes the common denominator was a meal the Red Cross served.

Angie Fox, volunteer manager of the Porter County Red Cross, referred questions to the county Health Department.

Health Department administrator Keith Letta was noncommittal about the cause, noting he is aware of probably 20 people who became ill among more than 300 who were at the crash site between emergency crews, contractors and railroad representatives.

Rudd, however, said the department began investigating chemicals or food poisoning as possible causes when it started receiving complaints on Monday. So far, chemicals appear to have been ruled out as the cause of the vomiting and diarrhea.

Meanwhile, a Chicago law firm already is advertising, via the Internet, that it is searching for anyone injured by chemical exposure or whose property was damaged in the crash, for a potential lawsuit.
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Southsider2k12
post Sep 10 2013, 10:37 AM
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http://posttrib.suntimes.com/22457628-537/...eport-says.html

QUOTE
A texting train conductor who was traveling almost 30 mph over what was safe for conditions helped cause in a Jan. 6, 2012, train collision and derailment in Jackson Township, according to a federal report.

Other causes of the crash include inattention to wayside rail signals and poor communication. The report also said a device called a “positive train control system” could have prevented the accident by stopping the train automatically, according to the National Transportation Safety Board.

The crash, which involved three westbound CSX trains headed to Chicago, caused the temporary evacuation of residents within a one-mile radius of the accident site, near Porter County Roads 600 North and 500 East. Spilled diesel fuel from the locomotives caught fire, sending a plume of smoke high into the sky; the crash site continued to smolder the next day.

The texting conductor and the engineer on that train, who were not identified, both suffered minor injuries, and the crash temporarily disabled one of the nation’s key freight corridors.

All told, the NTSB report, released Aug. 20, said the crash caused $5 million in damages.

CSX does not dispute the report.
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