Posted on 04/05/2025 11:01:20 AM PDT by Morgana
A Pennsylvania family is mourning the loss of their father and his two sons after all three were struck and killed by an Amtrak train in what police called a 'horrific tragedy.'
The family of three were fatally struck by the high-speed Acela train, which can reach speeds of up to 150mph, bound from Boston to Richmond, Virginia, at around 6:10 pm near Bristol Station.
Christopher Cramp, 56, and his two sons, David, 30, and Thomas, 24, were identified as the victims in the tragic incident by friends and family on social media.
Sabrina Gartner, posted about losing her father and two brothers on Facebook, she wrote: 'Losing the three of you is crazy. Forever loved and will be missed!'
They were spotted as Bristol Borough police responded to reports of people on the tracks at Beaver and Prospect streets just before 6pm.
Police were walking up onto the rail line to remove them from the tracks when they saw all three people struck by the train, Police Chief Joe Moors said at a press conference on Thursday night.
'When our officers arrived, the sergeant was starting to head up to the subjects up on the railroad tracks when an Acela high-speed train traveling southbound towards Philadelphia struck all three subjects that were up on the track,' Moors said, according to WHYY.
Moors added that the tracks would be closed for 'several hours' while an investigation took place into the 'horrific tragedy'.
(Excerpt) Read more at dailymail.co.uk ...
I’ve seen people give local and national TV interviews in regards to some personal tragedy......I’ve never understood how people can do that.
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Of course I’ve never understood people’s obsession with wanting to be on television in general so what do I know. 🤷
My son worked for Conrail in Selkirk, NY for several years as a dispatcher. Thankfully it never happened to him, but at that time, whenever a train hit someone or something on the track, the engineer, and the dispatcher were suspended with pay from their jobs until a thorough investigation occurred, and they were cleared to return to work.
My son has kept in touch with people he worked with, and it appears that Conrail closed their Selkirk, NY office, and moved all the dispatcher jobs to Florida. How one is to successfully oversee a set of tracks that isn't even in the same state as you is beyond me. He also said that when he was a dispatcher, and you were put in charge of a new region of tracks, the company would send you out on one of the trains, so you could ride over that region, study and visibly see, inspect, and take note of the track layout and area you would be responsible for. This would take more than one day. They don't do that anymore.
My father was a Track foreman for New York Central. He retired in 1966. Back then he and his work crew would ride up and down the tracks, and walk the tracks visibly inspecting them for problems. They'd fix the ones they could, and my Dad had to file a report every day on the problems that were more serious that they couldn't deal with that day. They don't do that anymore either. My son says there is a guy who inspects the tracks, but instead of walking the tracks, and visibly looking for problems, this guy wears a vest of some kind with all kinds of electrical tech stuff on it. He lays on the ground and lets the vest inspect that part of the track and evaluate it for problems. It just sounds so bizarre to me.
I thought they must have been in a car...
They were walking on the tracks ???
I was caught
In the middle of a railroad track (thunder)
I looked ‘round
And I knew there was no turning back (thunder)
My mind raced
And I thought, what could I do? (Thunder)
And I knew
There was no help, no help from you (thunder)
Sound of the drums
Beating in my heart
The thunder of guns
Tore me apart
150 mph gives no warning
I call this the Jerry Springer lifestyle. I’ll never understand why people make public things that are better left in private.
Prayers up for the police who saw this and the first responders who had to clean this mess up.
And the Train drivers (whatever they’re called) who saw this and knew they couldn’t stop in time.
AMEN. SELFISH.
Myself and other Officers were chasing a burglar on the tracks NY State. It was a six track set, with a turn about three hundred yards away. As we were trying to run him down here comes an Amtrak at about 85 mph out of the turn. We all scattered and the perp jumped into the Hudson. We never found him
Never heard of that. They do have tech trains that X-ray the tracks for problems.
Thank you for that. Most people never think of the crew that cannot stop a train while someone is standing between the rails.
Yep, it just shifts the pain onto the people who love you.
Sorry, I don’t find that the least bit funny.
Having to try to help mentally ill people, especially loved ones, is horrible. It torments the people around the ill person endlessly. “If only we had done this or that! Will he/she get better? Will he/she relapse? What can we do to save him or her?” The torment for all involved is horrific and never ending.
No sympathy for stupidity and that’s exactly what this is. There’s no way in hell all 3 needed to die because one wanted to take his own life.
I know it’s normal not to click links around here, but if you read the excerpt, they were just on the tracks, there was no gate/crossroad. They weren’t stuck..
I saw that later. Suicidal son/brother, father/son trying to drag him off the tracks.
I still think if it hadn’t been a 150 mph train the result might have been different. Nobody expects something coming at them that fast. They probably thought they had enough time and then they didn’t.
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