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By AAron [email protected]
The city of Panhandle awoke to a thunder-like crash and the roar of a fireball Tues-day morning as two freight trains collided head-on, in-
juring one man and leaving three others unaccounted for.
Two BNSF Railway freight trains were traveling on the same track when they col-lided about 8:40 a.m. Each train had a conductor and an engineer on board.
One man jumped from one of the trains as they ap-proached one another. He was transported to North-west Texas Hospital by Claude EMS and was in stable condition at press time. Three other BNSF employees remain un-accounted for and emergency crews on the scene are continuing to search for them.
“We saw it right after it hap-pened,” said Virginia Mize who lives near the scene of the wreckage. “There was just smoke, cars and people. The conductor or the engi-
neer, he was going over to the am-bulance and had blood gushing down his neck and down his back.” Mize said she lives extremely close to the accident site.
The names of the four BNSF em-ployees have not been released.
“Unfortunately, we do feel that they may be still trapped in the train at this time,” said Sgt. Dan Buesing
of the Texas Department of Public Safety. “We won’t be able to confirm that until the fire is under control... It will be some time until the fire is under control before they can start moving the heavy equip-ment out to get to those family members that we are trying to confirm.”
Diesel fuel from the loco-motives caught fire upon
impact and the black plume of smoke that reached hundreds of feet into the air was visible throughout the day in Amarillo, nearly 30 miles away. Although the blaze was under control, firefighters continued to deal with the burning fuel well into the night.
See COLLISION, A11
AMARILLO GLOBE-NEWSWEDNESDAY, JUNE 29, 2016650,000 MONTHLY READERS
IN PRINT AND ONLINE FINAL n 75 CENTSVOLUME 107, NO. 236
V I D E O S , S L I D E S H O W S , B L O G S A N D M O R E A T A M A R I L L O. C O M
8 50046 00001 0
WORD OF THE DAY: Definition, See A2outlaw
InsIDE: Beilue: Big things ahead for All-American Soap Box Derby winner. A6
ADVICE A12 | BUSINESS A11 | CALENDAR A2 | CLASSIFIED B7 | COMICS B14 | CROSSWORD A12, B4 LOttERy A2 | MOVIES B4 | OBItUARIES A4 | OPINION A13 | SPORtS B1 | WEAthER A14
Sean Steffen / amarillo Globe-newS
After two BNSF freight trains collided head-on tuesday near Panhandle, it took hours for the train engines’ diesel fuel to burn off as first responders show-ered the crash site with water. See amarillo.com for more photos and footage from the wreck. IPad users, click the AGN TV logo for a direct link.
3 missing after collision
By BiAncA r. [email protected]
A revealing analysis of Amarillo Police Depart-ment shows widespread dissatisfaction among its employees. Issues over leadership – or a lack thereof – were prevalent in
an 86-page report deliv-ered to city council mem-bers on Tuesday.
While the in-depth in-vestigation into APD’s policies and procedures is nearly six-months in the making, the delivery fol-lows an announcement last week that Police Chief
Robert Taylor will retire at the end of June.
A recent open record request obtained by the
Amarillo Globe-News shows the police chief dropped from an 8.5 to a 7 ranking in his annual
performance review. Ques-tions about how the rank-ing system works and to provide context into the numerical change have yet to be answered by city staff.
Lorne Kramer, a man-aging partner of consult-ing firm KRW Associates,
said his scrutiny of APD showed employees did not have a good sense of the department’s vision, don’t know what the future looks like and don’t have a clear vision of expecta-tions from management.
See APD, A3
KRW report: APD employees display widespread dissatisfaction
BNSF has pledged to meet a 2018 federal deadline to adopt technology called posi-tive train control, or PtC, that relies on GPS, wireless radio and computers to monitor train positions and automati-cally slow or stop trains that are in danger of colliding, derailing due to excessive speed, or about to enter track where crews are working or that is otherwise off limits.
At least three freight rail-roads have said they’ll need an extension to 2020.
BNSF spokesman Joe Faust said in a statement tuesday that the West texas collision is the type of accident PtC can prevent, and that BNSF is “aggressively” pursuing it “across our network.”
“While sections of the track operated by the east-bound train involved in this accident have PtC installed and are being tested, the section of track where the incident occurred will be installed later this year,” he said in the statement.
— The Associated Press
Was new safety technology in use?
ThE TypE of loComoTivE: GENEral ElECTriC ES44DC
ENGINE TyPE12
CyCLINDER
FuEL CAPACITy5000 GALLONS,
DIESEL
HOrSEPOWEr4,400
WEIGHT416,000 POUNDS
LENGTH73 FEEt, 2 INChES
SPEED70 MILES PER hOUR
Kayla burKS / for amarillo Globe-newS
EyEwiTNESS aCCouNTS
Head-on freight train wreck near Panhandle triggers massive fire
“I don’t know how anyone survived. It’s terrible. I’ve seen a number of train
wrecks but I’ve never seen one like this.”billy brown a farmer in the area
“We saw it right after it happened. There was just smoke, cars and people. The conductor or the engineer, he was going over to the ambulance and had
blood gushing down his neck and down his back.”
VirGinia mizelives near the scene
See A11 for more eyewitness accounts.
InsideSee A11 for a map of the wreck and recent train wreck-age inci-dents in the area.
Want to know more?n See A3 for examples supporting KRW’s report. n Visit amarillo.com to read the full review and action plan.
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