1970 Cars Auto Transport Train Crash

[Mr70]

Anyone ever hear stories of a waiting customer or Pontiac dealership whos' cars were on board this train back then?

~<span style="font-style: italic">In 1969,an Illinois Central coal train was speeding down the mainline outside of Riverdale,Illinois.Ahead of this coal train was a string of autoracks being pulled by a switcher.Before the crash,the coal train became a runaway and slammed into the rear of the autoracks,throwing twelve of them aside before the lead loco came to rest under the thirteenth one.Around 100 coal cars jackknifed into a space of about one city block,a bridge was collapsed in the wreck,the lead unit which was a GE U25B locomotive,was totally destroyed.The crew members on the coal train all died and were later found buried under all of the coal that was piled up where the crash began.</span>

This was also the sight of Potowatami Village before the area was completely resettled.The founder of Dolton Il. and Riverdale Il. had homes on this point of land,near the wreck of the train.Probably operated the first toll bridge here too.

[Geoff Smith]

Great information - I wonder what happened to the cars?

Being that they were brand new and all??

[ds1]

Back then If they were damaged they were to be destroyed at a local salvage yard. Some may have been given to schools for students to learn on

[Canuck]

For liability reasons , all cars have to be destroyed once involved in a train wreck or shipping accident.

http://www.caranddriver.com/features...n-snafu-at-sea

[StealthBird]

Haven't seen the 1970 derailment, but here's some from 1967 showing some unfortunate Pontiacs.

Mike

[Mr70]

Boy engineers sure hated Pontiacs..

[enio45]

Brings back memories when i used to work on the railroad - track gang......

Lots of overtime hours available when we had to go in an clean up a wreck.

[bbbentley]

I worked in a high end salvage yard, that is, till Obama closed all the dealerships and I lost my job in 2009,(I digress), where we received &quot;New&quot; cars damaged from wrecks, tornadoes, floods etc...We could keep just about everything except the frame which we had to video (as proof) the cutting up of the frame and the detonation of the airbags. Most of the new cars were GM that this yard got, but others, as well. GM made the owners put in specific (elaborate) upgrades and buildings as part of the contract to get these cars and it was expensive I'm sure, but it was what you had to do to pla with the big boys and get the good stuff. It would break your heart to see some of the stuff we dismantled, because it had very minor damage. Brand new Vettes were one example with maybe bumper damage. Crew cab Duramax trucks with just two small dents in the roof were careless truck haulers raised them up into the carrier frame above, we got several of those.