Whoa, I’m a former southern Californian and know the area of this commuter train wreck well. I just barely saw the beginning newscasts of this before starting off for work this morning, and it looked ugly. A few co-workers of mine used to use that route, too.
Are all our commuting Glendale-area Dopers okay?
I’m watching the local NBC news about it right now–you’re right, it’s ugly. The cause, a Jeep Cherokee left on the tracks, was intentionally left there (not an accident/stall). Police are questioning the driver.
Another update–there’s a news conference going on right now.
Glendale’s Chief of Police says the driver of the Jeep Cherokee is in custody. He was suicidal, and parked his car on the tracks. He had a last-minute change of heart and got out of his car and watched as the train hit and wrecked.
So far, 10 dead (one being an officer of the LAPD, apparently) and over 100 injured.
Well, I guess I’m not taking the Gold Line downtown for a few days.
That looks horrible. I wish MTA had gone to more effort to elevate or subterrain the train lines, despite the costs. In Pasadena (Del Mar and Fillmore Stations) the crossing signals sometimes become stuck and remain active though no trains are coming, so people have learned to just drive around the barriers. Someday someone’s not going to be paying attention and get t-boned, though this appears to be a deliberate effort.
Stranger
I live less than two miles from where that happened. Tragic.
Not to make too much light of a tragedy, but did anyone else wonder if this mobilized Kiefer Sutherland into action?
The news is reporting that this tragic accident was caused by some moron who decided he wanted to kill himself, parked his jeep on the tracks, changed his mind at the last minute and got out of the jeep. He got a front row seat to the carnage he caused.
What a moron, if he’d have just laid down on the tracks he could have gotten up and walked without injuring anyone else but he decides to park his jeep there? He might not have even been killed if he’d been in the car.
What a thoughless a$$hole.
In the immortal words of Frank Zappa, “Nothing’s worse than a suicide chump.”
The Gold Line doesn’t go through the affected area, does it? It has its own tracks, and it doesn’t go through Glendale. Last I checked, light rail tracks are a different size from normal train tracks, so the Gold Line couldn’t have been on the same tracks as a Metrolink anyway.
It was indeed a hell of a train wreck, on an extremely busy section of track. The first Ventura train of the day is always pretty packed. I’m glad I take a later train (or, today, a hastily-scrambled bus that then takes two hours to inch its way through rush hour and crash-related road closures).
When I left for the train station this morning, the death count was three – every time I’ve checked back, it’s gone up. Ten people so far who should have just had a normal day at work or school, not to mention the countless others who were injured and terrified. On the bus, the cel phones never stopped ringing as peoples’ friends, family, and coworkers heard about the wreck and called to make sure they were okay. Metrolink riders can be a very close-knit community, and a lot of people were worrying about friends and acquaintances who might have been on that Ventura County train, as well as trying to find out which conductors were involved.
I woke up at about the time of the crash – I’m not sure if it was just on the edge of my hearing (I’ve been woken up by the past few train accidents in the area) or if it’s just coincidence.