From: utzoo!decvax!ucbvax!C70:railroad Newsgroups: fa.railroad Title: SF Zephyr Derailment Article-I.D.: ucb.1362 Posted: Tue Jun 15 19:17:35 1982 Received: Fri Jun 18 03:13:06 1982 >From sytek!msm@LBL-UNIX Tue Jun 15 19:17:24 1982 a218 1251 15 Jun 82 AM-Derailed, Bjt,580 One Killed And 23 Injured As Train Derails In Flood By MARK MITTELSTADT Associated Press Writer EMERSON, Iowa (AP) - The Amtrak passenger train San Francisco Zephyr rounded a bend at 76 mph just outside this flooded city Tuesday and hit a "wall of water," killing one woman as it jumped the tracks. Sixteen people were hospitalized and 150 suffered minor injuries, mostly cuts and bruises. Mills County Sheriff Ed James said 400 volunteers, some of them in boats, helped rescue the 200 passengers inside the 12 cars of the train that derailed after the tracks were washed out by floodwaters 3 to 4 feet deep. Martha Francois of Galeskburg, Ill., said she was telephoned by her daughter, Jenna Ehrenhart, 17. Her daughter said she saved a 1-year-old child from a railroad car that was sitting in the water, and the pair were evacuated by boat. The child's mother, the daughter said, had been crushed betwee"]{ cars. Terri N. Thomas, 19, of Santa Maria, Calif., was dead on arrival at Montgomery County Hospital in nearby Red Oak, according to Allen Pohren, assistant hospital administrator. Zephyr engineer Joe Schwartz of Omaha, Neb., a 30-year railroad veteran, said he and another crew member had been talking about the water along the railroad right-of-way just before the train bound from Chicago to Denver jumped the Burlington Northern Railroad tracks about 3 a.m.. "We came around a curve, saw the water and put the train in emergency," Schwartz said. "Then we derailed." "The lights went out and then there was a whole lot of screaming," said 12-year-old Jason Bridie of Clarinda, Iowa. "We were all thrown out of our seats." Jack Crandall, head of Iowa Disaster Services, said, "The engineer said he was going 76 mph and was rounding a bend and suddenly there was no track in front of him." State Rep. Bill Harbor, who was at the scene about 2 1/2 miles outside Emerson, described what the engineer saw as a "wall of water" running over the tracks when he rounded the turn. The front of the train went under an overpass and derailed. The two- unit engine came to rest in the water running from farm fields into Indian Creek. The floodwaters had undermined the roadbed and railroad ties floated down the creek. A baggage car behind the engine came to rest on its side and the remaining cars tilted but remained upright, as floodwaters swirled around the wheels. The Iowa Office of Disaster Services had already opened its disaster headquarters in Des Moines on Monday night because of widespread flooding in western Iowa, where up to 9 inches of rain fell. Hundreds of people were evacuated from homes in Emerson, and the neighboring towns of Glenwood and Malvern, as water ran 5 feet deep through the streets. Gov. Robert Ray declared Mills County - the Emerson region - a disaster area, making it eligible for state aid, and Nebraska Gov. Charles Thone offered the help of the National Guard from his state. Amtrak passengers were taken to emergency shelters set up for flood evacuees in an Emerson school, and later two busloads were taken to the train depot in Omaha for alternate transportation. ap-ny-06-15 1550EDT ********