Option Three: Derailment in Oxford, Iowa
5:00 p.m. Train 81 Arrives Davenport
Paperwork with train identification, engine numbers, cargo, etc. are put into a torpedo cone and tossed underhanded out the train window to the depot door. The agent at Davenport picks up the paperwork, records it, and teletypes the information to Des Moines to let them know what was coming.
Pass Walcott, Stockton, Durant, Wilton, Atalissa
7:00 p.m. Arrive Iowa City
Pick up orders.Pass Vernon and Tiffin
Train has traveled approximately 68 miles
"As Train 81 approaches Oxford, the town is off to the right, with a vacant lot between the town and the siding. As the train comes out of a curve and straightens out on the flat track, it begins to slow down to 50 mph approaching the station agent who is standing near the tracks holding up the orders. Approximately 425 feet before the train got to the depot, it came off the rail and went into emergency. When the station agent heard it, she took off running."
When a train goes into emergency the brakes are automatically activated. An extremely loud whooshing sound is heard when the air hoses, which are located between each car, come apart. Once the hoses separate, the train automatically goes into emergency.
PICTURE HERE OF AIR HOSES
The engineer is on the right front side facing west. The fireman is on the left side, with the brakeman in the middle seat. The conductor is on the caboose. In this particular derailment, the first four cars, as well as the caboose, are not affected so the crew is safe. On the fourth car back from the front of the train, the knuckles come apart detaching the first four cars from the rest of the train. The crew remains in place hanging on until the train comes to a complete stop.
As the knuckle breaks and the four cars in front separate and continue to roll away from the depot, the rest of the cars start piling up on top of the depot, obliterating it. This wooden structure does not stand a chance against this massive leviathan as 75 foot cars begin to pile on top of it, car after car after car. The noise is deafening, sounding like sonic booms with each car weighing as much as 100 tons crashing into, and on top of, each other. These thunderous booms are accompanied by the sound of earsplitting screeches of metal fiercely scraping against metal with sparks, and possibly fire, spewing in all directions from the friction. The cars continue to pile up, boom, boom, boom, completely destroying the depot and the siding. In a matter of seconds, the entire train of 60+ cars, with the exception of the first four cars and a few rear cars attached to the caboose, are completely destroyed. The entire area looks like a war zone.
ARCHIVES PHOTO John Goodin Papers Collection 482
Once everything stops, and it is safe to get off the train, the engineer and the brakeman start walking. The silence is deafening. Train cars are folded onto each other like an accordion. Debris is everywhere. There are no radio signals at this time. There is no way to contact anyone except by phone. The engineer maneuvers his way past the debris to the phone box at the other end of the siding, which is nearly a mile away, to call the dispatcher. This would normally be done by the station agent, who would have reported the arrival and passing of Train 81, but the depot is destroyed, and the station agent is nowhere to be found.
When the engineer reaches the phone box at the end of the siding "you'd unlock the box, take a stick and gently lift the box lid up. If there was a big bee’s nest, which there was a lot of them in there, you’d take a fuzee, [put the fuzee in the box] and you’d just lay the box lid down, you had a little metal plate in every one of those things. The sulphur coming out of the fuzee would kill the bees. Then you’d open the lid, and the bees that were still alive, you’d take your gloved hand and throw the nest away. You knock the fuzee out on the ground and then call the dispatcher."
The engineer tells the dispatcher "we are in a ditch in Oxford all over the depot and we are shut down." The chief dispatcher then calls the division superintendent and manager, who alerts all the VIP's, and all will immediately report to the derailment. Wreck crews are needed from both sides, Des Moines and Silvis. The alert goes out to all stations to HOLD ALL TRAINS!
“When it got stopped, we couldn’t find the station agent. The whole thing was piled up on the depot. I mean the thing was [depot] destroyed. So, there was nobody to get hold of the dispatchers or anything like that, so we walked. The only thing that was open was a bar, about two blocks up on the left-hand side. So we got in there, and here’s the station agent, and she’s got a shot of whiskey, both hands on a shot of whiskey, and she can’t get either one to her mouth. So, the conductor takes the drink from the station agent's hand, and she was so shook, she said, ‘there’s nothin’ left!’ The depot was completely destroyed, but nobody got hurt.
The crew had to wait for pickup after briefing. Then they were taken to Silvis to fill out derailment reports. Each member of the crew would be interviewed individually, each one giving their description of what happened.”
There are many possible causes of derailment: damaged track, damaged wheel, car collisions, signal errors, movement at a critical rate of speed. It was determined that this particular derailment was caused by a flange on the 3rd car back of the engine which had worn thin and caused the wheel to climb over the rail.
The wrecking crew, approximately 40 workers, will not arrive until the next morning. Wrecking crews consist of a foreman and workers from individual stations who take care of the tracks. Each station is notified to send four workers to the site of the wreck.
“[The next morning around 8 or 9:00 a.m., the wrecking crew brought a train with ten plus cars, got off, and when they got down to the wreck, the first thing - they were looking for the foreman, who wears the only white hat. [The foreman is the only person authorized to give directives. He assesses the situation and tells each person what to do.] He [the foreman] said “swing that crane over here and we’ll dig that up. We dig up the siding, pulled the tracks out, and dug a hole. We must have had a hole 30 feet deep and 40 or 50 feet long [using a] big CAT [caterpillar]. We went out and put two 50-foot cars down in there and buried it back over. I said, ‘What did we just bury?’ and he said, ‘Two car loads of Heinz ketchup and all the bottles are broken. And he said, I don’t wanna live with those flies!’ and to this day that ketchup is still there."
Clean up could take as much as five or six days, with hours and hours of grueling, painstakingly slow and backbreaking work. Cats, or Sideboom Caterpillars, with massive hooks would be used to lift debris onto the flatcars for transport. Wreck crews would be physically cleaning up smaller debris by hand. The spillage from the cars, as well as damaged cars and tracks, all had to be cleared.
The crews would be changed every 16 hours. There were bunk cars for sleeping – three bunks on both sides. A dining car and cook were provided.
PHOTO-CAT Archives of Appalachia – Kenneth Riddle Collection of Cy Crumley (Folder 9-12 tank loaded) Acc 572
"After burying the cars, we created a shoofly so other trains could pass. Then the cars would be picked up with a hook and placed on the other side of the siding to clear a path for trains to run through the shoofly.
The flatcars brought by the wreck crew would be loaded with debris. These would be taken 80 miles to the wrecking yard at Kelly Yard Terminal in Silvis at a speed of 25mph.”
More information on derailments may be found in the Archives of Appalachia interview with Gary Emmert, or in the Carolina, Clinchfield and Ohio Railway Collection #96. Box 122