<<< Handy Dandy Notebook: February 2003 >>>
February 19, 2003: Today was kind of a weird day. First of all I hear on the news this morning that a Kaukauna woman was killed in the early morning. Turns out it happened right next door to someone in my study hall and her daughter is a fellow senior student. That was discussed a bit in school today. Then when my mom came home she had some big story to tell me. Turns out that a train hit a semi-trailer at a railroad crossing just down the tracks from my dad's shop. He felt the ground shake and noticed the power go out right away. When he looked out the window he saw a train slowly rolling down the tracks, front smashed in and paper hanging off the sides. He ran to it and there was a dump truck driver standing there, saying he did not want to see what was up there (in the engineer compartment). Luckily my dad is not a wuss like this guy and climbed up to see if the conductor was okay. The guy was crawling around the cabin in a daze, and then my dad saw that he practically had a hole in his forehead. My dad told him to sit down and ran to get a crowbar. When he got back he was able to get the door open (with definite effort) and the guy actually walked out. My mom told me that my dad went back to the shop before the news crews got there. We watched the 6:00 news on all three channels to see if he was mentioned. They said that the engineer was pulled out by "rescue workers" and that if it had been much longer, he might have died. My dad got no recognition whatsoever for practically saving this guy's life. And what is even worse, the guy that just stood and watched got interviewed! Luckily they did not air that on the newscast. A weird day indeed.
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