I bet this was a bit unnerving indeed, from AOL ; Jessica Method, 23, was riding the Caltrain back to San Jose, CA when she fell asleep. When she woke up, she was trapped in the empty train inside a railyard. "I had been working all week, I had eaten a big dinner, I was tired and it was late and I just fell asleep," she said. The lights inside the train were still on and luckily the doors were open, but there was no one around. She also discovered her cell phone was dead. Jessica says she then pulled several emergency levers on the train, all in a desperate attempt to get someone to come. "There was a few fences I would have had to jump, not easily, and that's when I reverted to a few other options." That's when she ran to open the conductor's cabin and found a two-way radio. Two maintenance employees working the graveyard shift quickly came to her rescue. Jayme Ackemann, Caltrain Spokesperson says, "the conductors involved were disciplined and we're going to be talking to all of our employees to remind them about the protocols and what's appropriate for closing up for the night." Anything to stop this real-life nightmare from happening again!
I had a somewhat similar situation but it was on a Western Pacific freight train in northern California not Caltrain. But the sense of bewilderment was probably similar. see excerpt from my book about these adventures below. I woke up first the next morning. The first thing I noticed was that we werenot moving. Why were we stopped? Where were we? I looked up over the side of the gondola car and noticed large Pinetrees, probably not in a train yard. Iheard what sounded like rushing water. Ialso noticed it was way cold outside, and although it was light outside, thesun definitely wasn’t shining on us. Mysleeping bag had a frozen crust on it. Ilooked back towards the end of the car and the bo was rolled up in a fetalposition in the back corner of the car. I fumbled to get my boots, and they were very stiff from the cold. I slipped them on, and without tying them, Istood up and looked over the wall of the gondola car. Yes, we were stopped on some kind ofsiding. There was a fast moving riverjust beyond the tracks and a 2 lane highway across the river. I scanned down the train towards thelocomotive, and there were about 8 cars in front of us and no locomotive. Quickly looking back, there was no cabooseeither. We had been disconnected in themiddle of the night and slept right through it!!! I quickly woke up Kirk, and explained thesituation as I knew it. Where werewe? What do we do now? How can we getacross the river? Will there be anothertrain along to pick us up?
