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From: "Walter Smith" wsmith5957 AT hotmail DOT com
Date: Tue, 25 Jul 2006 17:31:51 -0400
Subject: A bad day at Syracuse Engnehouse
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This is a re-write of a story I posted about 3 years ago. I told Schuyler
Larrabee that I had fotos to go with some of my stories and with this one I
have a track plan showing the former DL&W roundhouse tracks & the NYC
crossing in the story...........

As Snoopy would say 'It was a dark and gloomy night'.........
It was the practice of the ERIE-LACKAWANNA as it had been for their
predecessor, the DL&W, to run two trains from Syracuse, N.Y. every night to
Binghamton and back. The earlier of these 2 trains was designated SB24 and
was usually on duty at 7:30 PM or so. This job always had 2 GP-9s since it
was a fairly light train. The other train SB-50 was somewhat heavier and did
more work. It, therefore ran with three engines and took a little longer to
get over the road. As you can see, this required the roundhouse people to
assemble the power for these trains prior to the crews coming on duty which
meant gathering the several Gps which had been on locals and industrial jobs
in the vicinity and checking them for faults and supplies so they'd be ready
to go. The night roundhouse foreman was a Mr. William (Bill) Laumeister who
was very knowledgable and like most of the DL&W men all business. He was
ably assisted by the night mechanic Mike O'Brein, who was in his early 20s
and had just been dischargeid from the US Air Force. I had been in the Air
Force too and he and I used to sit outside the roundhouse office (in the
warm weather) and talk about the USAF. When you it outside the roundhouse
office, you are facing the inbound and outbound tracks, the sand track, and
5 & 6 as well as facing the turntable.
In order to better understand this story, you should know that the DL&W
roundhouse is in a depression about 15 feet or so below the level of the
yard tracks. The New York Central branchline to Auburn which crosses the
inbound and outbound EL tracks to & from the roundhouse and passes in back
of it on the way to Auburn from the New York Central's uptown yard which was
next to the DL&W yard. There was a tower (Magnolia Street) which sat at the
crossing but the crossing was automated and protected by derails and dwarf
signals and the old white tower served as a reminder of busier times. Before
coming to the tower, you passed over a city street on heavy girder trestles.
You had to get permission to crossover everytime you came out with power.
On the night in question, O'Brien and I were sitting outside enjoying
a warm night and gazing at the engines - 3 on one track and 2 on the other.
At about 8 PM or so, Mr. Laumeister announced his intention to go to the
nearby Dunkin Donuts for coffee. O'Brien told me that the early crew (SB24)
would have to take the three nearest engines up the hill, crossover then
come back and set one of them on the 2 already on the sand track as power
for the later traiin (SB-50).
The early crew arrived and O'Brien went over to go with them for the short
ride up the hill and across the New York Central after which they'd reverse
& come back on the sand track to couple the trailing unit to assemble
SB-50's power. I hadn't noticed the engineer & headman's unsteady gait as
they walked to the engines. O'Brien got on the footboards and off they went.
I sipped my coffee and waited, and waited, and waited, and waited and HERE
THEY CAME!!!!! Two GPs sailed down the grade as I sat mesmerized, thinking
"Now, he'll shut off & take some air", "SURELY NOW he'll shut off and
brake". To my horror, the engines emitted a flurry of sparks into the night
sky as the throttle was advanced and instead of slowing, rushed into the two
engines already there with an ear-splitting CRASH. I swear the two GPs
leaped a foot into the air and smashed back down onto the rails but none of
them derailed. A huge cloud of dust rose and the locomotives all shut down
as knife switches opened along with other safety devices. I saw that O'brien
had jumped and rolled in the cinders on the embankment and he and I
approached the scene. I saw there was oil and water dribbling from all the
locomotives, and the engineer was slowly crawling down from the cab showing
a large wet pee stain all over the front of his coveralls where he'd voided
his bladder. He staggered around the front of the roundhouse clutching a
beercan and saying oudly "This is all my fault. I'm drunk and I'll admit it.
*hic* I know I'm drunk."The head brakeman had run away and left the
property.
O'Brien said to me "What a mess." I agreed and said "Yeah, I don't
think you'll be using those engines tonight." O'Brien said "NOOOO, I mean
the mess on the New York Central crossovers". NOW IT STRUCK ME..........they
went up the hill with three engines and came back with two. Where was the
third engine??? O'Brien enlightened me - they had run through the dwarf
signals and derials and the engine was laying derailed on thecrossovers. I
headed up the hill to 'straighten things out' and found the GP groaning away
with it's driving wheels mangling rails and shredding ties & ballast. I went
up into the cab and found the throttle in #3 AND a half-empty can of
Carlings Black Label beer sitting on the throttle stand. I shut the
throttle, set the brakes and threw the beercan out the window. I then threw
the drinking water all over the floor and swept out the cab.
Looking toward town, I saw lanterns coming from the New York Central yard
office. Time to leave.
Back at the roundhouse, I found Mr. Laumeister had returned to the
scene from HELL. The engineer was still staggering around in his pee-stained
overhalls mumbling about his being drunk and he now placed his beercan on
the roof of Mr. Laumeister's new Chrysler. Old Bill dashed it to the ground
and yelled,"Get the HELL off the property, you drunken fool!".
I don't know WHAT they told the New York Central but NO trains ran
to Binghamton that night. Much later I heard the crew got 10 days off. I
suppose nowadays they'd have you burned at the stake (with torture first).

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