I am looking for the date of the derailment of the SAL's northbound Silver Meteor (No. 58) at Raleigh, North Carolina. I have a number of newspaper accounts of the wreck, but they are undated. Eight cars of the 18-car train derailed in Raleigh between Morgan and Hillsboro Streets about 1 a.m. as the train was slowing to stop at the station. Passengers were shaken up but no one was seriously injured. The three unit diesel locomotive consist and the first seven cars of the train were not derailed. Hundreds of spectators watched the clearing of the derailment from the Morgan Street bridge. Photos in the newspaper shown derailed streamlined passenger equipment.

-- William E. Griffin, Jr. (griffinwejr@aol.com), November 30, 2002

Answers

Bill:

Through the kindness of Harry Bundy, I have a copy of the September 19, 1951 ICC accident report. Unfortunately, this accident involved a light locomotive with defective brakes striking a work train. Seems that the derailment of the Meteor did not make it as an ICC report!

-- Michael W. Savchak (Savchak@mnr.org), December 26, 2002.

Bill:

I checked my ICC accident report files-they have an accident report for the April 8,1961 derailment of the local where the locomotive was wrecked, but no mention of any derailment of the Meteor. Perhaps I can help date the accident if you can send me a copy of the newspaper reports. Please contact me off this website.

For the other respondents, please be aware that the US DOT files for the ICC accident reports are not complete and in some cases are mis filed-a good example is a 1935 FEC wreck listed as happening in 1955. Use these reports with care as many are mis-spelt and poorly transcribed.

Thanks again for your help in getting me the data for my latest Lines South article!

-- Michael W. Savchak (Savchak @mnr.org), December 02, 2002.

I didn't see it on the DOT page of wrecks,but i saw a few up around Kitrell and the surrounding areas.Raymond is right about the Passenger train wreck at Rennart,a buddy of mine was flagging down there recently for overhaed bridge construction and evidently the car that were too messed up to fix were buried,because the contractors dug up a whole lot of stuff that was left there.Nothing worth bragging about!

-- Vic Lewis (TrkInsp5F33@aol.com), December 01, 2002.

Mr. Griffin: Check the ICC report for train accidents that is online. This file goes way back and is the actual ICC report file with the time and date, causes, etc. I know it shows a couple of accidents at Kittrell. Also, it has a very detailed report of the "famous" ACL accident back in the 40's between Rennert and Buie, NC.

Later, RS

-- Raymond Smith (aclrr7@hotmail.com), November 30, 2002.