Casey Jones - Illinois Central Railroad Report On Accident

Illinois Central Railroad Report On Accident

A conductor's report filed just five hours after the accident stated "Engineer on No.1 failed to answer flagman who was out proper distance. It is supposed did not see the flag." This was the position the I.C. would later take in its official reports.

The final I.C. accident report was released on July 13, 1900 by A.S. Sullivan, General Superintendent of the I.C., and stated that "Engineer Jones was solely responsible having disregarded the signals given by Flagman Newberry." John M. Newberry was the flagman on the southbound No. 83 that Jones hit. According to the report he had gone back a distance of 3,000 feet where he had placed torpedos on the rail. He then continued north a further distance of 500 to 800 feet, where he stood and gave signals to Jones's train No.1. But doubt still lingers about the official findings and some wonder where Newberry was positioned that night. Some feel he wasn’t there at all. Some say Jones was "short flagged," but Newberry was an experienced man and he had flagged No. 25 a short time before. In the report Fireman Sim Webb states that he heard the torpedo explode, then went to the gangway on the engineer's side and saw the flagman with the red and white lights standing alongside the tracks. Going then to the fireman's side, he saw the markers of the caboose of No. 83 and yelled to Jones. But it would have been impossible for him to have seen the flagman if the flagman had been positioned 500–800 feet before the torpedoes as the report says he was. Once the torpedoes exploded the train would have already been too far past the flagman’s reported position for him to be visible. So if Webb did see the flagman at this point, he had to be out of position at about 3,000 feet north of the switch, not 3,500–3,800 feet north as stated in the report, which means Jones was indeed "short flagged." It's possible that after the flagman flagged the No. 25 freight through, he heard the commotion as No. 72's air hose broke and everything got jammed up with No. 83 fouling the main line. He may have gone to No. 83 to find out what the situation was, assuming he had time before Jones arrived. He then headed north along the tracks and placed the torpedoes, but by then Jones may have come roaring out of the fog before he made it to his reported position. If this is what happened, Jones lost a good 500–800 feet of stopping distance, which might have prevented the collision. In any event, some railroad historians have disputed the official account over the years, finding it difficult if not impossible to believe that an engineer of Jones's experience would have ignored a flagman and fusees (flares) and torpedoes exploded on the rail to alert him to danger.

Contrary to what the report claimed, shortly after the accident and until his death Webb maintained that "We saw no flagman or fusees, we heard no torpedoes. Without any warning we plowed into that caboose."