A Railroad Sent Two Trains Out of Chicago at the Same Minute in 1946 and One Caught the Other

On April 25, 1946, two Burlington express trains left Chicago Union Station at the same minute, 12:35 in the afternoon. Thirty minutes later, at Naperville, Illinois, the second one ran past a yellow signal, a red signal and a flagman and struck the first, which had stopped because a brakeman saw something fly out from under it. Forty-five people died. A week later the railroad ran a test train over the same track to show that the engineer could have stopped. The fifth run of that test, an emergency stop from the first place the red signal could be seen, ended 393 feet beyond the spot where the last coach had stood. The Interstate Commerce Commission's report made one recommendation, about passenger cars built like the lightweight dining car. On speed it deferred to a docket it had opened 25 days after the wreck. That docket became the order of June 17, 1947: on any line where a train runs at 80 miles an hour or more, the railroad must install automatic train stop, train control or cab signals. The same order said a railroad could make it inapplicable by slowing down. The line is still in the federal rules at 80, and it is a major reason most American passenger trains are limited to 79. Chapters 0:00 Naperville today 2:01 The Racetrack 5:45 Two minutes 11:35 The engineer 18:56 Docket 29543 24:22 The old grade Sources Interstate Commerce Commission, Investigation No. 2988, Chicago, Burlington & Quincy Railroad, accident at Naperville, Ill., report of July 30, 1946 (U.S. Department of Transportation library). Railway Signaling, 1946 to 1949: Burlington Tests Show Signals Adequate; I.C.C. Signaling Investigation; Signaling Order Issued by ICC; Railroads Request Relief From the I.C.C. Signal Order; ICC Holds Signal Hearing. Salt Lake Tribune, Salt Lake Telegram, Deseret News, Ogden Standard-Examiner, Provo Herald and Logan Herald-Journal, April to June 1946, carrying the Associated Press and United Press reports (Utah Digital Newspapers, University of Utah). Associated Press and International News Service reports of June to October 1946, including the air hose letter and the grand jury's decision. Code of Federal Regulations, Title 49, section 236.0. Naperville Century Walk, Tragedy to Triumph by Paul Kuhn. Naperville Community Television, 75 Years Later (2021). Film United News newsreel, 1946, National Archives 208-UN-205: the wreck at Naperville. Passenger Train (Encyclopaedia Britannica Films, 1940), A Great Railroad at Work (1942), Life-Line of the Nation (1944), This Is My Railroad (Southern Pacific), Mainline U.S.A. (1957), Big Trains Rolling (1955), Hoosier Line, a Missouri Pacific film, Safe Roads (1935), Chicago (1936), Mason Furniture Company: Prelinger Archives. The Town and Troop Train, U.S. Office of War Information. Naperville and the Racetrack today: Central Indiana Railfan, Big Shoulders Rails, Dennis DeBruler, BryantFan1813!, Greg Arnst, I Am The Wombat. The Burlington E5 Silver Pilot: Walt Loevy. The California Zephyr from the air: OmahaTom. Signals: Jersey Mike's Rail Videos. All Creative Commons Attribution. Photographs Jack Delano for the Office of War Information, 1942 and 1943 (Library of Congress). Roger Puta. Historic American Engineering Record. Wire photographs as printed in the 1946 newspapers. Wikimedia Commons contributors: CC BY: Big Shoulders Rails, BryantFan1813!, Central Indiana Railfan, Dennis DeBruler, I Am The Wombat, Jersey Mike's Rail Videos, OmahaTom, Walt Loevy. CC BY 2.0: David Wilson, H. Michael Miley, Loco Steve, Ralph Mayer, vxla. CC BY 4.0: 4300streetcar. CC BY-SA 2.0: Adam Moss, H. Michael Miley, Roger Wollstadt, Teemu008. CC BY-SA 3.0: ArnoldReinhold, Darienredsox, Gfoley4, Sturmovik, Wusel007. CC BY-SA 4.0: Amethyst Holman, Bcsimon15, Chris Light, Lectrician2, Sea Cow, Xnatedawgx. Terrain: USGS 3DEP, USDA NAIP aerial imagery, OpenStreetMap contributors. Distances on the map are the Commission's own. Thumbnail: a real frame of the 1946 newsreel. Every picture in the film is a real photograph, document or film, named on screen. The narration is a synthetic voice. The Old Grade reads the record of what happened on North America's railroads. If you ride this line, or your family worked at Kroehler or on the Burlington, tell me what you were told about that day.