Railroad lights

BTW, where is her law office located?

Nothing happens violently or suddenly at 5 mph.

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Assuming you have a car, give it a try and post back . Go exactly 5mph and then slam the brake.

I just did and the impact was violent.

What’s even funnier is the lady in the passenger seat of my car asking me why the heck I just did that for ( referring to the aggressive slam ).

Hey, are you picking on my speling?

You do know there is berry rittle difference between the 'ballet" and a “ballot”

You can have a “male” in the Ballet and you can have a “mail” in Ballot
 L :roll_eyes: L . . .

I always type up my responses in Microsoft Word and then paste the reply into the edit box and I must have really blown the spelling on “ballot” and I must have been a victim of “auto-correct” and did not notice the word exchange when I “proof read” the reply


And if you consider the context that I was using the word, I plead, “No speaka da Inglish
”

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image

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As an Operation Lifesaver presenter, years ago I asked a railroad signal maintainer about the time the mee-mool lights (o)T(o) flash before the gates begin to descend.
He said they should flash 6 seconds before gates begin descent.

The grade crossing signals are to begin operation a minimum of 25 seconds before the locomotive (or railcar if the train is backing) enters the roadway.
The signal maintainer said some crossings have an even longer period before the gates begin to descend because of slow semi tractor-trailer rigs. In that case the (o)T(o) begin operation 30 seconds before train arrival.

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That would seem to cause more people to drive around the gates.
I stop when the lights are flashing.
Last week, local TV news did a story on accidents at rail crossings, as they were recording a guy on a bicycle road around the gates. He was lucky, at that crossing trains come through at 50-60 MPH.

Theyvill drive around the gates, anyway, if they can.

The bicyclist likely looked to see how far away the train was.
Or crossed 10 seconds after signal activation which left 1/4-minute before train arrival.
(On an emergentransport of blood platelets I crossed 9 seconds after (o)T(o) activation, no gates.
Knowing the train “should” not arrive for another 15 seconds, I slowed enough to stop before the track andistened and looked in case signals activated late.)

When a man went around gates after a westbound train passed he was killed by an eastbound train unseen behind the westbound train.

Similar to this: (“
 appeared to be shaken up but not seriously injured
”)

Very scary video. Damn. Sucks he died.

When I destroyed the gate in 2016 or 17, the mistake I made was stopping as the gate began descending. The police officer, when arriving at the scene, told me I should have continued on as stopping created more problems.

I was in shock, though, and my ability to react appropriately went out the window. It was after the whole disaster ended I saw how I could have avoided the situation.

The police officer was willing to excuse me but his boss wasn’t. There were 7 or more cops on the scene and they all spoke to me and wanted to excuse me but their boss over the phone told them they must give me the maximum punishment, which were:

  1. Failure to stop
  2. Attempt to go around the gate.
    Total 10points.

The 7 cops then told me to take the matter to court and that they wouldnt show up.

My lawyer negotiated with the judge and settled with a 3point violation

I should have simply proceeded on while the gate was coming down but I feared getting hit by a train, so I stopped and immediately began to back up. There were 2 gates, and one of them hit the top of the car and also cracked the back windshield.

The gate came down without the light flashing.

Here is one important thing I noticed since the incident.

At sunset, the sun directly shines on the railroad lights and I observed that when the sun directly shines on the lights, the flashing red lights are incredibly hard to see. This made me rethink what happened in 2016-17. Was I blinded by the sun as to why I did not see the flashing red light ? Was the lights affected by the sun?

Suggest to consider the possibility that you did the best you could in that situation. After all, neither you, the train, nor anyone else incurred a serious accident. Attempting to go around the gate would indeed be a foolish thing to do; but you didn’t attempt to do that. And apparently the judge agreed. Score one point for the American judicial system I guess.

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I guess that we don’t have anyone near me that resides in the flash card section. The two RR crossings nearest to me have lights and no gates. I can’t speak for anyone else, but when I drive across the RR tracks I slow down and look both ways before crossing, regardless of whether lights are flashing.

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Back about 1962 our game warden was killed by the rock island going through town about 30-40 mph. I can still see the pic of that mangled 61 ford. There were just lights at the time and the gate was added later. Going home for lunch so there was no sun in his eyes. No one knows why. Thinking of something I suppose and on the tracks at the wrong time. I know his daughter and a very tragic thing for a 15 year old to lose her dad like that.

I suppose it was about 1965 that the restaurant owner was heading to the bank and ran smack into the side of a train. He was looking at an other property he owned and not paying attention. Hurt but not badly. The funny part is another employee saw it and he came out of his car holding the money bag for the guy to take to the bank. Then they took him to the hospital and towed his car but the money got to the bank.

I’m pretty careful with trains. Lights, gates, no warning, I always check both ways. Ya wanna depend on lights or gates working, up to you.

There is usually a loud bell ringing when the lights flash.

That does not help a Deaf person any


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The bells are meant for pedestrians.
Often not heard inside vehicles with windows closed and stereo playing.

Interestingly, if a wire to a (o)T(o) lamp breaks, the current flows through both right and left lamps. The voltage now flowing in series through both lamps makes each lamp less bright, but at least both lamps illuminate simultaneously!

I believe he panicked. I know the feeling. I have been there. When the gate began to come down on me, I was numbed. It was like my brain yelling “ You are going to die!”

It was after the aftermath I realized I could have done a lot better.

Watching the video you posted brought back memories. Sad stuff.

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This is typical for personal injury lawsuits.
Many other types of lawsuits require you to pay as you go and hope to recover your losses and fees if you win. Sometimes, it can take very deep pockets to pursue legal actions if they go beyond small claims. Often, the other side has retained lawyers that know very well how to make it financially unviable for the average person by continuing to drag out the legal process and bills keep mounting in the meantime.

In order to bring suit, you need to show harm and legal standing. You can’t win on “what ifs” or if there is no actual financial loss


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You don’t “ have “ to read or watch a content if you don’t want to. You have the choice to ignore or skip to another more satisfying for you.

If my post telling people to read their manuals and that would lower the stupid question count was enough to get the post removed. Then I think a fatal train crash certainly would be a case for post removal.

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