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(erielack) RULES OF THE OPERATING DEPARTMENT



            Speaking of Rule 220 - page 40 of the Rules of the operating 
Department/Erie-Lackawanna Railroad. This rule clearly states that 
"Trainorders are in effect until they are fulfilled, superseded or 
annulled". CSX has this same rule and it applied to the employees of the 
TRI_RAIL.
       Shortly after the TRI_RAIL began operating, an entire train crew was 
dismisssed and one of the rules broken was this particular one. It happened 
as follows...........
      The crossing gates at 79th Street in Miami (a heavily traveled 4-lane 
road) were inoperative and the CSX began isssuing a trainorder to 'Stop and 
flag 79th Street acct gates inoperative.' This went on for several days 
since it is easier to issue a T/O rather than repair the gates. On the day 
of the disaster, a passenger crew left the Miami airport station and 
approaching 79 th street on the mainline, stopped and flagged - thereby 
complying with the trainorder. On the Southbound trip, they did the same, 
stopped and flagged the crossing. Now, they had to return from the airport 
station and enter the yard to put their train away, having comleted their 
days work. The switch to enter the trainyard is JUST across 79th street and 
the engineer had his train slowed to near restricted speed to enter the yard 
lead but did not STOP. He properly sounded the horn with the 2 longs, a 
short, and a long but traffic had backed up on all 4 lanes and an impatient 
man raced around the other stopped autos and arrived at the crossing at the 
exact same time as the train. His car was hit and became airborne landing on 
a car headed in the other direction. The mans' little boy died, the man was 
injured, and a party in the other car was injured. I believe the CSX fixed 
the gates the next day but the crew was GONE forever. These were all 
experienced men..........not newhires.
       A few years later, gates were inoperative at a crossing near Boca 
Raton and the same thing happened. Another crew forgot to stop and flag and 
a woman in a step van got right in front of the locomotive and was hit. 
ANOTHER crew gone for failure to comply with a trainorder.
        After hearing all this, you'd think everyone on the property would 
be aware of this particular rule but a conductor told me he had an official 
observing his train near Commercial Boulevard  station in Fort Lauderdale. 
He asked the official the reason and was told "you've been reported for 
delaying your train here". The conductor showed him a trainorder telling him 
to 'stop and flag Commercial Boulevard acct gates inoperative' . The 
TRI-RAIL man just said "OH" and left. The point here is.......all the other 
crews were just gliding through the crossing - NOT stopping and flagging.
      A year or so later, I was operating southbound and holding orders to 
stop and flag a crossing in Pompano Beach. As I approached the road in 
question (a 6-lane highway) a CSX signal maintainer came on the radio and 
said "I'm protedting the crossing, Walt, you can just take off". I thanked 
him and said I had a trainorder to stop and flag the crossing. He lost his 
temper and began yelling "I'm telling you to GO!! Are you going to delay 
that train??".  I said "I had a traiinorder and had he had it annulled by 
the dispatcher?"  By now we were at the crossing and conversation was 
screaming threats to have me fired, etc. I instructed my young assistant 
conductor to take the flag and flag the crossing which he did - staying well 
away from the CSX signalman who now began yelling on the radio "I won't flag 
for you anymore, Walt, I'll just let you crash right into cars!". I wshed 
him to have a nice day and proceeded to Miami only to find he had jumped 
into his truck and beat the train there and reported my crew to TRI-RAIL for 
'wilfully delaying a passenger traiin'. The ever-courageous TRI-RAIL 
officials told my crew to report to the redneck signalmans' office where he 
accuseed us of 'writing him up for delaying trains and it was all our 
fault". I looked him in the eye and told him I'd NEVER written him up. I 
then questioned my conductor and AC in his presence and they'd never written 
him up. I don't doubt soem crews may have, but not my crew.
After a few more threats, he subsided like a burping volcano telling us we'd 
"better be careful'.
      Until I left the EL and entered the chaotic world of present-day 
railroading, I had no idea how bad things were. I thank my lucky stars that 
I had a good grounding before entering the arena as it is today. I'm 
reminded of when I was a kid reading about the Japanese Kamikaze pilots - 
sent out with little or no training to do or die.

Regards to all

Walter E. Smith


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