Hit By A Train

Danny (a pseudonym) was hit by train. Simple as that.
Not quite as simple is the fact that he lived to tell me about it.

He was 18 at the time, cutting loose with friends one hot summer night at  a booze-laden beach party held on private property.

The private property was an area of the beach, surrounded by a fence.
Access was gained with a key... one of many keys distributed to members of the Homeowners Association whose residences were alongside, or close to, the beach. It's not a gated community. Just a gated beach.

My sister in New York City lives across from a gated park like that.
You need a key to get in and walk yourself, your dogs, or just sit on a bench and unwind.
I never knew there were small parks like that in cities -- with fences, locks and keys --  until I visited my sister in New York.

Fast forward many years into the future from my first learning of locked parks.... to another locked park in an area Northwest of Seattle I was investigating.

This locked park was bigger and alongside the water.  It was in an upscale neighborhood. There was a Cabana -- a big club house -- plus restroom,  a children's play area, picnic tables, and a huge expanse of green grass that led to the beach. There are railroad tracks you must cross on the green grassy area to get to the beach.

As I moved through the park towards the tracks, I noted cliffs on both sides of the private beach area. The cliffs were quite steep, the terrain covered with sticker bushes and rocks: some big and solid boulders; some loose and untethered smaller stones inbetween soil which was moist on the day I worked the scene.

A thick layer of clouds was overhead.
I was alone as I usually am.
I had my camera and my P.I. license in a waterproof pocket of a hooded jacket I wore.

I  received the case earlier that week from an attorney, I  wanted pictures before the fall rains hit.

The accident happened at the end of summer. It was a weekend  before school was to begin. The kids... about 20 of them.... were between the ages of 16 and 18 and celebrating the last weekend of summer at a night party in that locked beach area. The locked beach area closes at sunset unless reserved by someone in the Homeowners Association. On the night of the accident, the space was reserved by no one and the  kids staked their unofficial claim.

The party started about 9:30 pm, when one of the kids, whose parents belonged to the Homeowners Association, put his key in the lock at the gate of the beach park and let in the first round of friends.

One boy wedged a piece of cardboard between the base of the metal gate door and the gate post, so  the gate  would remain unlocked for the arrival of the others....  who slipped silently out of their houses or cars and into a party their parents may, or may not, have known about at the time.

Meantime, the keyholder, was in the cabana downing his second shot of tequila with his best buddy Danny.

It's hard for me to believe this may come as a surprise to many parents, yet I know it does. Most parents have no real clue what their kids are up to. They want to believe the best, so they do.
However, kids... teens...  do bad things behind their parents' backs. Guaranteed.
In this investigator's opinion, there are no saints among most teenagers.

Underage, they do drugs, mostly pot, some cocaine, meth, crack, ecstacy, mushrooms and other hallucinogens. They also take pills from their parent's own medicine cabinets.  Or have their own sources to score uppers, downers, painkillers in the schools and on the streets.

So, the keyholder, his friend Danny, and the other kids were celebrating a last free weekend before school in the park at the beach.
The sun had set late that night as it always does in the Pacific Northwest summer.
On this night, it set close to 10:00 pm.

The kids were partying hearty behind the metal gate, though they made a point of keeping the volume down. They did not want to end their party by disturbing their neighbors who would then call the cops. This particular group of kids was tight, they'd known each other since childhood, they knew to chill and keep their voices low.

When I first  studied the scene it was daylight. I planned to return again after dark to get the feel of the night. I wanted to see everything clearly first.

I had the police report in hand and followed the scene sketch on the report, impressed by the officer's accurate diagram and well-written narrative. There was great detail in the report.

Bottom line...  Danny, 17, was walking on the train tracks heading towards an on-coming train. Danny was hit by the train that sounded all requisite horns when Danny was spotted. Danny survived and was airlifted to Harborview.

I first met the victim and his parents in intensive care,  before I went to the scene. The parents were the ones who called the attorney who called me. Danny's friends filled the waiting room,

I knew what the injuries were before I got there.
Impact to the right side of his body. Brain injury, right arm amputated, right pelvis and  hip broken, right leg crushed. Right leg may also require amputation. He was right-handed.
Recently awoke from coma, brain damage affecting memory, speech, moods.

Even though I knew what to expect,  I wasn't prepared for what I saw.
Being hit by a train is ugly.

I have done five train hits. Three of the people hit died. Only two  survived.
Danny was a survivor, though I am not sure how, because he walked into an oncoming train.

It looked like his body had been ripped in half. His arm was missing from it's socket. He had bandages covering the right side of his head. He lost his right eye, the orbit crushed. There was a Frankenstein line of stitches traversing his face and what other areas of flesh I could see on the right side of his body.


They'd been partying for almost two hours. It was close to midnight.
At one point Danny walked away from the two girls and a guy he was talking to.
Then he stepped on the train tracks  and walked down the middle of them. He was walking to the cliffs, his back to and away from, the party.

Danny was stoned, drunk and had just taken a cocktail of prescription pills  that included tranquilizers, painkillers, muscle relaxants and cocaine. It's a wonder the pills didn't kill him before the train him.

Danny walked by himself, down the tracks while his wasted friends observed him.

Then  one girl saw a beam of light approach. Another person saw it. The observation spread from kid to kid as the beam of light grew in size... and the ground rumbled... and  they all realized a train was coming and Danny was walking into it.
Some guys raced towards Denny, while other people froze, or screamed out warnings.

Then the train horns sounded when  Danny's figure was a silhouette on  the tracks.
The screech of brakes blended with the screeches of the horrified young witnesses at the moment Danny was hit.

It  appeared to those witnesses that at the very last minute,  Danny realized the light at the end of his  tunnel was a train because he attempted to leap off the tracks starting with his left foot, when the train impacted his right side. It was this last leap of fate... or faith... that saved Danny.

The engineer of the train stated he didn't see Danny until it was too late to do anything.
Upon impact,  Danny  was tossed in the air, away from the train instead of under it.

When the train stopped, panic and chaos ensued until the police arrived.
Then came the usual order of such traumatic scenes....  the ambulances,  firetrucks, airlift, interviews, drug tests, there's a whole lot that goes down when someone is hit by a train.

I was sent to see Danny, to review the police reports, talk to witnesses, to study the scene, to assess the case and liability.

Danny would have a lifetime of medial bills, his health insurance was already maxed out.
The attorneys  and Danny's parents wondered if liability or fault could be placed elsewhere so there would be more insurance funds available for Danny.
I photographed studied, measured, the scene. 
And as always, the questions came with every click of the camera.


Could Amtrak be held responsible for not having a crossing at the the darkened beach area?
Were the signs posted all over the private beach club gated area that warned of trains  "adequate warning"?
Did the engineer of that train handle the situation right?
Could he have stopped sooner?
Was he under the influence?
Could the Homeowners Association be liable because it happened on their property?
Could the homeowners policy of the parents  of the keyholder who let the kids in the gated area be  partially liable because, among other things,  their son was a minor, 17 and not under supervision?

I worked the scene. Talked to witnesses. Went back a second time to talk to Danny. He remembered one thing he didn't recall when he first saw me.

Danny said he heard a voice in his head.
It said "Walk to the light. "
After that he said, everything went black.
He did not recall  an attempted to leave the tracks, the hit, nothing but the light and the voice.
Nothing until he woke up from his coma in Intensive Care.


He was broken, battered, beaten down, depressed when we talked that second time. His mother was with us.

I said, "It's a miracle you"re alive Danny."

"Am  I?" he asked.

"Are you what?"  I asked back.

"Alive?" he said, as he turned his head away from me and his mother and cried.

At that point his mother cried too.
I went into positive energy mode.

"Yes you're alive Danny. You're just feeling like crap because you were hit by a train."
I paused for effect.
"Do you get that Danny? You were hit by a train and you lived! '
Another pause for effect.
"That makes you special.  Maybe even sacred. There's a reason for your survival. All you have to do is hang on, and you'll make it back."


"How do I hang on long enough to make it back?"  he asked.

I answered his question with a question.
"Well, how do you eat an elephant Danny?"
He stared at me silently.
I repeated the question and waited him out.
Finally, he said, "How?
"One bite at at time." I said. "And you got one big elephant to eat Danny"

Danny laughed. His mom laughed. And I figured that would be the perfect time to exit.
I said my goodbyes to them, wrote up my case notes which I delivered to the attorneys.

Bottom line, Danny, higher than a kite walked head-on into that moving train about midnight.
Other kids heard and saw the train coming, he didn't.

The attorneys weighed the possibilities and costs of taking Amtrak to trial.
There were no gates, no warning signs at the park.
But there were lights, a train horn and no expectations of anyone being in a  locked park that closed after sunset.
The attorneys considered suing the parents of the boy who let the kids in the park with his key.
They considered suing the Homeowners Association.
They considered the suing parents of the minors who brought booze to the party.
They considered suing the establishments that sold alcohol to the minors.

Yet, in the end.... they stepped away from the case.
Because they thought they'd be walking into a train by representing a client who put himself there in the first place.

And in my opinion,  the attorneys were right in their decision.
Because ultimately we are the arbiters of our own fate... based the choices we make.

Danny is still eating the elephant.
All his hospital bills were paid through the hospital's charity.
He got disability payments and health insurance through the state.
And the miraculous self-healing ability of the human body and mind revealed itself to Danny.

Despite  the fact that he will live his life in  a wheelchair with just one arm,  Danny ate enough of the elephant to help heal his brain and eventually get a  High School Diploma.
Last I heard, Danny was in his second year of  College.

Every story has a moral.
There are many possible morals here because there are many issues involved:
teens, parties, pills, alcohol, blackouts,  trains,  self destruction and the tenuous line between life and death.

Perhaps the moral is this:
Think of every move you make as a choice.
Tell your kids that drinking and drugs cause your brains to shut down.
Tell them Danny's story.