Kathy Adams
The Virginian-Pilot
©
CHESAPEAKE
A crane barge this morning helped removed a train that was dangling off the edge of a canal bridge in Centerville after it derailed early Friday.
The barge arrived on scene shortly after 12:30 a.m. and lifted the train so another could pull it back onto the track just before 2 a.m., according to a Coast Guard news release. Officials inspected the locomotive for safety issues before moving it just before 4 a.m.
Cleanup and repair work continues at the spot where the train, owned by the Chesapeake & Albemarle Railroad, barely avoided plunging into the Intracoastal Waterway early Friday morning. The train derailed on a trestle in the Centerville area of the city about 5 a.m., and the locomotive spent the rest of the day hanging over the water. The fuel tank ruptured, sending about 1,700 gallons of diesel into the water. By Friday afternoon, about 550 gallons had been removed.
No one was hurt, but the Coast Guard closed a section of the waterway between the Great Bridge Lock and Centerville Turnpike and began cleaning up the fuel. Environmental cleanup crews worked through part of the night, cleaning up 70 percent of the spilled fuel, according to the Coast Guard news release. Enough had been cleared by 9:20 a.m. for the Coast Guard to reopen the waterway with speed restrictions.
Watercraft traveling on the Intracoastal Waterway must use their slowest speed until crews complete the cleanup, according to the release.
Officials were inspecting the bridge to ensure it's safe, said Petty Officer Andrew Kendrick, a Coast Guard spokesman. The Federal Railroad Administration is investigating. The railroad declined to provide details about a potential cause.
The Chesapeake & Albemarle Railroad is a "short line" railroad that operates from Edenton, N.C., through Elizabeth City to Norfolk. Its major customers include ready-mix concrete plants. The company began operations in 1990 after leasing the line from Norfolk Southern Corp., according to the Railway Association of North Carolina's Web site.
"Right now, it's just under investigation is all we can really say," said Donia Crime, a spokeswoman for RailAmerica Inc., the Jacksonville, Fla.-based company that owns and operates Chesapeake & Albemarle Railroad. "Engineers are on site trying to assess what damage there is, if any, to the bridge, track and the locomotive."
The bridge was built in the 1920s and is used fairly infrequently. The Coast Guard said it is required to be kept open for water traffic and is permitted to close only for the crossing of trains and for maintenance.
"The fact that the incident happened on a bridge is what triggered us to go out there," said Warren Flatau, a spokesman for the federal railroad agency. "Anything involving bridges is something of interest to us."
Coast Guard crews, firefighters who specialize in hazardous materials, and a private contractor began the cleanup, and Coast Guard investigators and representatives from the Department of Environmental Quality also were on the scene over the weekend.
Federal rail safety data show Chesapeake & Albemarle Railroad has been involved in five incidents over the past 10 years, including three grade-crossing collisions in 2000 and a grade-crossing collision and derailment in 2005 that injured a railroad employee.
Flatau said the railroad's safety record is similar to that of other small railroads nationwide.
Pilot writers Mike Saewitz and Robert McCabe contributed to this report.
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Lt. Cdr. Robert Gore
Lt. Cdr. Robert Gore, the spokesman who is featured in the video, sure looks like Cuba Gooding, Jr.
Bigger, Brighter Bridge/Crossing Status Notifications
Usually there are signal lights along the rails indicating down-track status. Maybe the company can use some of the illuminating but still disturbing LED signs that the CoVB has such trouble with these days. With all the flash and bash, who would not have been awakened from slumber or brought back to attention from texting, or what ever caused the engineer to drift away from the duty at hand.
Good thing the trains was not loaded with coal or the bugga would not have stopped until it smashed both side of the crossing and littered the waterway with all manner of steel, wood, and coal.
Lucky . . .
A very lucky situation: none of the rail stock went into the waterway and no one was hurt. When it comes to derailments, this one is rather minor. The fun part will be getting the engine back up on the rails.
Either a safety signal didn't work or the engineer missed it. Whenever a bridge is in the open position, red indicators come on miles before the obstruction. It should be interesting to see what the investigation reveals.
It was dark at
4 or 5 in the morning probably not an automated signaling system in the cab
Give ne a break!!
First of all, This was a terrible accident and I am glad no one was hurt. Second of all,GIVE ME A BREAK!!!! relating this accident to offshore drilling, Because the train spilled fuel in the waterway, is utterly nonsense. Use your common sense.I hope you don't really believe that comment. I read idiotic comments on here all the time but this one takes the cake. And want to know the sad part, Many people like that comment. Maybe people liked it because it was an off the wall comment and they got a big kick out of it.
This would have been the train
that would have passed by my house at 5:30AM blowing his horn continuously and waking my wife up in a bad mood, as it does almost every morning.
If there are any railroad experts following this, why the heck must he blow that miserable horn when all the crossings in our neighborhood have crossing arms and flashing lights?
Probably some stupid regulation.
Reasons
Possibly, to alert the idiot driver who was rapt in his cell phone conversation/text instead of concentrating on what he was doing. (Don't laugh, it happens). To be fair, though, maybe the engineer was rapt in HIS cell phone conversation/text instead of concentrating on what he was doing. This ALSO happens.
This would have been the train
....railroad has been there for a long time. Why'd you move there genius?
YOUR COMMENT
seems out of character.
Yes, a regulation
The reason for the horn is SAFETY. They blow the horns due to a regulation that was passed, approved and in use long before your grandfather was born. If you don't like the noise, move away from the tracks. And here I thought you libertarians were all for the SAFE conduct of commerce . . .