Don't Panic! Lighten Up!

Man using GPS drives into path of train in New York suburb

Associated Press
Fri, 04 Jan 2008 07:44 UTC

BEDFORD HILLS, New York - A Global Positioning System can tell a driver a lot of things - but not when a train is coming.

A computer consultant driving a rental car drove onto train tracks Wednesday using the instructions his GPS unit gave him.

A train was barrelling toward him, but he escaped in time and no one was injured.

The driver had turned right, as the system advised, and the car somehow got stuck on the tracks at the crossing.

Metro-North railroad spokesman Dan Brucker says the man jumped out, tried to warn the engineer by waving and managed to get out of the way just before the train slammed into the car at about 100 kilometres per hour.

The car was pushed more than 30 metres during the fiery crash and some 500 train passengers were stranded for more than two hours during the Wednesday evening rush hour.

Reader Comments

System · 2008-01-04T07:47:48Z

Well...

Hope he took out the extra insurance.

Zadius Sky · 2008-01-04T08:08:59Z

I think this is one of the examples as to we would not need to be dependent on the computer to tell us where to go. GPS is a good system, but it appears to be inaccurate. Sure, it can tell you where to go, but you would end up in places you don't want to be, like being in front of a speeding train.

But, I'm glad the man is all right. It could have been worse...

System · 2008-01-04T09:34:36Z

Perhaps the problem here is that people very often just get into the habit of doing as they're told, without stopping to think of the consequences.

Perhaps they even feel safer if somebody else - even a computer - is in charge of them.

There's an obvious lesson for us all here imo ...