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Gulf Coast Train Derailment (Site)

GPS Coordinates: 38.7923714, -77.1539417
Closest Address: 5822 Tilbury Road, Alexandria, VA 22310

Gulf Coast Train Derailment (Site)

These coordinates mark the exact spot where the crash occurred. No visible remains exist.


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Here follows an excerpt from "The Iron Road of Franconia" book about the railroad written by local historian Nathaniel Lee.

The worst rail accident in Franconia's history, shown in the photographs above, occurred on the night of Tuesday, January 27, 1970. The Gulf Coast Special is a train that runs regularly from Jacksonville, Florida to New York City, and carried 125 passengers in ten passenger cars on that fateful night. The oily marine clay in the roadbed caused a 200-foot section of rails to shift as much as three feet out of place after a strong rainstorm earlier in the evening. The train had just passed under the Capital Beltway and was negotiating a ninety-degree turn north of Valley View Drive when it jumped off the tracks at 12:10 a.m. The train was travelling well above its maximum speed of 80 miles per hour around the curve even though the speed limit in the section of track west of Van Dorn Street is only 65 miles per hour.

The conductor of the train, Edgar L. Vaughn, reported that he was in one of the coach cars when the train "started bumping on the ties and all of a sudden it lurched over." The last car on the train derailed going around the curve, dragging five other cars off the tracks with it, four coaches and two Pullman cars. The crash injured 54 people and killed three women. The victims were Eva King Witherspoon of Baltimore, Maryland, Mrs. Clara Fleming of Goldsboro, North Carolina and Mrs. Eliza McCray of Trio, South Carolina. An inspector for the National Transportation Safety Board said the three women were riding in the first coach car, which flipped on its side. The three women, thrown out of the windows, became pinned beneath the railcar as it scraped along the right-of-way. as the engineers brought the three-engine train to a halt, three of the derailed cars slipped down the 60-foot muddy embankment, knocking down small trees along the way. The inspector blamed poor track maintenance for the wreck.

Firefighters from Alexandria and Fairfax County, including Franconia's own Volunteer Fire Department Company No. 5, had difficulty in reaching the remote crash site in the woods. It was nearly a mile away from any major roadways. Once rescuers and civilian volunteers were on the scene, they found the area around the train to be a nearly impassible quagmire of mud. Initially, the only gear that rescuers could get to the wreck site was what they carried in on their own backs. Rescue workers worked through the night to cut through the wreckage and free the passengers trapped inside. Paramedics transported injured passengers to hospitals nearby in Alexandria and Fairfax for treatment. The uninjured were offered a free ticket to board another train in Alexandria to continue their trips. Stuart Shumate, the president of the Richmond, Fredericksburg, and Potomac Railroad at the time of the wreck, turned away questions from reporters regarding financial damage estimates. The Washington Post quoted Shumate as saying, "The real sad thing is that three people were killed. You can always fix up steel."

ABOUT ME

Award-winning local historian and tour guide in Franconia and the greater Alexandria area of Virginia.

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ADDRESS

Nathaniel Lee

c/o Franconia Museum

6121 Franconia Road

Alexandria, VA 22310

franconiahistory@gmail.com

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