John Delach

Most people who know me are aware that when I was six-years old in 1950, my mother made me take an oath that I would never ride in the first car or the last car of a commuter train. This oath followed a disastrous crash between two trains that killed 74 riders on the Long Island Railroad (LIRR) on the Wednesday evening before Thanksgiving. All of the fatalities were in the last car of the first train and the first car of the second train.

On October 28^th, a similar crash took place on a high-speed line in Spain between Madrid and Barcelona. One train was stopped while the second was cleared to proceed. Neither engineer or driver as they are now called was at fault. The computer system had failed and a dispatcher in the central control in Madrid authorized the second train to move again without restricting its speed. He should have restricted the speed to 40 kilometers or 25 mph, but he didn’t. The other train remained stopped awaiting its orders to move. The second train reached a speed of over 100 MPH when it struck the first train 15 miles later killing 69 riders.

In 1977, we moved to Port Washington and I began my daily commute on the LIRR. Not only did I keep my vow to my mother, I grew more sophisticated about where I should sit on the train. Since Port Washington is the end of the line, every day I selected to ride in the fifth car from the back of the train. This put me in the middle.

Going home, I usually rode in the third or fourth car from the head of the train out of Penn Station.

You ask why I selected these cars? Let’s take a look at the recent wreck. The first train consisted of eight coaches. The photos in the  NY Times shows that the rear car, coach No. 8, was knocked off the track and cut into two large pieces. Coach No. 7 was knocked completely off the track and sent down the embankment. Coach No. 6 was knocked partially off of the tracks with the five remaining coaches left intact on the rails.

The first coach of the second train was also heavily damaged. The second coach was seriously derailed. The third coach was partially derailed and the remaining three coaches of this six-car train remained on the rails. Let the record show that the middle of a train is the safest place to sit.

Have I ever made an exception? Yes, but only when I was under duress not to miss a train scheduled to leave. Other than that, the answer is no.

Once I ran into an old acquaintance when boarding the train in Port Washington. He asked me to join him as he was about to enter the last coach. “No thanks,” I said, “No first or last for me and have a good day.”