Virginia Trestle Accident Doesn’t Deter Rail Trespassing

A fatal accident on a train trestle in Amherst County, Va., hasn’t deterred people from trespassing on railroad tracks.

Lynchburg dispatchers received five track trespassing calls just a few weeks after a Liberty University student was hit and killed by a Norfolk Southern train as she walked with a group of classmates on a trestle. Four other students were injured in the Nov. 17 accident.

Norfolk Southern spokesman Robin Chapman tells The News and Advance that there’s a misunderstanding about how trains work. Freight trains don’t keep regular schedules. If a train has passed recently, there could be another one behind it.

Chapman also says a train traveling at 35 miles per hour can take up to half a mile to stop.