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Trainman’s override
suspected in tragedy
CHICAGO (AP) — The crash of two
elevated trains that killed 11 and in
jured more than 200 may have been
caused by a trainman’s overriding an
automatic braking system or the
failure of an electronic signal,
authorities speculated today.
Accompanied by a loud crack and a
flash of light, the rearend crash of the
two rush-hour trains in a snowstorm
Friday evening sent carloads of
screaming passengers crashing onto a
downtown Loop district street below.
“It was horrible, just horrible,"
Erica Williams, 33, a passenger, said.
“We were making a turn. The next
thing I knew I was falling forward. I
heard a terrible noise and that was it."
“Everybody was flying, seats,
everything...” said Marie Anselmo, 56,
of River Forest, one of hundreds of
downtown workers who were headed
home.
Some passengers were sealed in
mangled coaches, while others spilled
out of windows and dropped to the
pavement to be buried under debris.
National Transportation Safety
Board investigators today were to start
probing the wreckage.
One train had been stopped when it
was struck from behind by a second at a
sharp curve at Lake and Wabash
streets on the northeast comer of the
elevated Loop circling downtown
Chicago.
Officials said the cause was not
determined immediately, but they said
it was possible a trainman had
overridden an automatic braking
system, one component of a
multimilliondollar safety system in
stalled last year after another collision.
James McDonough, chairman of the
Chicago Transit Authority, which
operates the elevated trains, said the
cause could have been an electronic
signal malfunction.
The driver of the moving train,
Stephen A. Martin, 34, was in serious
condition at Northwestern Memorial
Hospital.
The train stopped on the tracks was
loaded with downtown workers headed
for the city’s Northwest side. It was hit
by a train full of commuters bound for
stops on the West side and the suburb of
Oak Park.
“People fell out of the train and the
train fell on top of them,” said Agnes
McCormick, who witnessed the crash
from her table in a nearby restaurant.
Two cars toppled from the tracks to
rest on their sides in the street. Another
stood on end, leaning against the super
structure that supports the elevated
tracks. A fourth was piled atop one of
the two cars on the pavement.
Rescuers with hacksaws and torches
worked for two hours in snow and 20-
degree temperatures to cut survivors
and dead bodies from the wreckage.
Police put out an emergency request
for doctors and blood donors.
Standing on a crowded Loop street at
rush-hour, James Kilroy heard
screams. He looked up and saw four
cars of the train he usually takes home
plunge off the elevated tracks.
“I met an old friend on my way to the
train station and we got a little carried
away. I missed the train, but man was I
lucky,” Kilroy said. “We were standing
here talking about the good ol’ times
and then we heard a lot of screams and
a loud noise—like a big thud—and that
was it.”
The crash was the latest in a series of
collisions and derailments that have hit
the aging elevated tracks of the
Chicago Transit Authority. On Jan. 9 of
last year, 333 persons were injured
because of what was termed a signal
malfunction.
In 1974, there were four serious train
accidents involving the CTA. The worst
was a similar rear-end collision at a
South Side stop that injured 224 per
sons. Another 41 persons were hurt in a
September 1974 wreck.
Griffin, Ga., 30223, Saturday Afternoon, February 5,1977
Fishing report
X * .-tx °
1-X o The Georgia Department of Natural Resources’ fishing
I forecast for the week of Feb. 5-12 includes:
]HIGH FALLS: Normal, clear. No activity.
JACKSON: Low, clear. No activity.
SINCLAIR: Down, stained. Good for catfish.
Girl Scout leaders
burn their uniforms
AUSTIN, Texas (AP) — “It hurts me
very deeply to have to do this,” said
Mary Ann Holman, a Girl Scout leader
for 18 years. She then dropped her
blazing uniform into a trash can to
protest the organization’s support for
the Equal Rights Amendment.
Both she and Dot Schedler, another
scout leader and the 40-year-old mother
of three Girl Scouts, had tears in their
eyes as they stood Friday in the
driveway of the Holmans’ fashionable
North Austin home and watched flames
engulf their uniforms.
“I wish we had some cookies, we’d
throw them in there (the fire) too,” said
Mrs. Holman, a member of the Lone
Star Girl Scout Council board of direc
tors.
Mrs. Holman, the mother of two Girl
The Country Parson
by Frank Clark
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Elevated trains lie on street in Chicago after crash.
Scouts, and Mrs. Schedler were ob
jecting to the national organization’s
recent decision to endorse the proposed
amendment, which has been ratified by
35 of the needed 38 states.
Mrs. Holman said the national en
dorsement violated their charter since
the group is a non-profit organization.
She said the group is not supposed to
take sides in political issues.
The 44-year-old mother said she
burned her uniform reluctantly and did
so only “because these days if you don’t
do something sensational, nobody
listens. That’s a sad thing, I think, but
that’s the truth.”
Both she and Mrs. Schedler, whose
daughters are now grown and are no
longer in the Girl Scouts, resigned their
Scout positions.
“With a heavy heart, I here
by...dedicate these ashes to those
responsible for the betrayal of our
beloved Girl Scout promise and law,”
said Mrs. Holman.
Calling the amendment “un
necessary,” she charged that the
feminist movement and National
Organization of Women founder Betty
Friedan, also a member of the national
Girl Scout board, were “more and more
directing the course of the scouting
movement.”
Wanda Rice, executive director of the
Lone Star Girl Scout Council, said the
women’s protest would have no affect
on the local Scouts, since it was di
rected at a national issue.
Vol. 105 No. 30
People
••• and things
Nurse to patient at Griffin-Spalding
Hospital who wanted to know what kind
of pill he was taking: “That’s your good
luck pill.”
Man at city reservoir wetting a hook
as temperature rose above freezing.
Couple in their 60s on way to see
“Golden Oldie” follies at Griffin High
auditorium.
Suspect
in killing
escapes
FORSYTH, Ga. (AP) - A South
Carolina man, arrested last month in
the slaying of a 19-year-old convenience
store clerk from Cochran, escaped
from the Monroe County jail Friday
night, sheriff’s deputies said.
Roosevelt Green, 20, escaped through
a window at the jail, said Sheriff L. C.
Bittick.
He was arrested in Conway, S.C.,
Jan. 10 on robbery charges and later
was linked to the slaying of Teresa
Carol Allen, 19, of Cochran.
Miss Allen was abducted from a
convenience store where she worked.
Her body was found Dec. 14 in a wooded
area in Monroe County, and police said
she had been shot in the head and
stomach.
Green had been charged with
murder, armed robbery, kidnaping and
auto theft.
A second man, Carzell Moore, 24, of
Cochran, was arrested and charged
with murder, armed robbery and kid
naping in the case.
Bittick said Moore was still in
custody.
Weather
ESTIMATED HIGH TODAY 55, low
today 35, high yesterday 62, low
yesterday 31, high tomorrow in mid 40s,
low tonight in upper teens.
FORECAST: Fair tonight and
Sunday.
Alex Campbell took advantage of the rising temperatures Friday afternoon to
take a unicycle ride in a pasture off Rehoboth road. He’s the son of Mr. and Mrs.
Jim Campbell, 432 South Sixth street.
Cold trend?
maybe not
ATHENS, Ga. (AP) - Weather
watchers sometimes leave James
Shear cold.
“People are too prone to take a few
cold years and treat them as if it is the
start of a long-term trend,” said Shear,
a University of Georgia geography
professor critical of prognosticators
who see this year’s cold weather as a
forerunner of icy winters to come.
“The scientific community, as well as
the general public, likes to assign
trends,” he said. “They like trends
because they lead to extremes, like the
prospect of a glacier in your back
yard.”
Shear has more than 30 years of
experience in meteorology and
climatology, including a stint as lead
scientist at a research center in
Antarctica.
Although temperatures plummetted
to record lows last month, February
could be the warmest ever and next
winter could be mild, he said.
Shear said the only thing scientists
know for sure is that this winter’s lower
temperatures were caused by an ab
normal wind pattern, which may or
may not occur again.
The attention given to authors of
forecast trends disturbs Shear.
“They aren’t the only weather
philosophers,” he said. “On another
level, you have the barbershop talk that
ever since we landed on the moon,
things haven’t been the same.”
Naptha
barge
explodes
MOBILE, Ala. (AP) — A barge-load
of naptha hit the Cochrane Bridge and
exploded into a burning spill in the Mo
bile River early today. It shook the port
city but no injuries were reported.
“I was knocked to my knees,” said
Charles Greenwood, an oil company
guard who was standing on a dock be
side the bridge when flames suddenly
rocketed 100 feet into the predawn air.
The barge, one of four linked
together, was carrying between 20,000
and 30,000 barrels of highly flammable
naptha, an oil derivative, the U. S.
Coast Guard said.
There are 48 gallons to a barrel.
