The Best of Reader's Digest

by Editors of Reader's Digest

  Hosfeld and another supervisor dashed down the tower and leapt into a truck. Believing the train was just coasting, they planned to race to the first crossing, jump aboard and stop it. Just 12 minutes later, calculating that they were well ahead of a slow-moving train, they pulled up to a crossing in the tiny village of Dunbridge and surveyed the tracks. There was no train in sight—it had already gone through.

  Hosfeld almost choked at the realization: “It’s not coasting—it’s under power!”

  “Catch it!”—The dispatcher’s order sent Hosfeld, Knowlton and Forson on the ride of their lives.

  It was about 12:40 p.m., May 15, 2001, and hundreds of unprotected crossings and dozens of towns lay in the train’s path. A loaded freight under power was a weapon weighing thousands of tons. It could blast through a village like a Tomahawk missile. The town in greatest danger was Kenton, about 70 miles south. There was a steep downhill grade and 25-m.p.h. curves as the track weaved into town, passing fuel storage tanks, gas stations and homes. If the runaway crashed into those tanks, there could be an inferno.

  Instantly railway officials warned police in towns all along the line.

  * * *

  At that moment a gleaming blue and yellow locomotive was leaving Kenton headed north, directly into the path of the runaway. Engineer Jess Knowlton, 48, and conductor Terry Forson, 30, were piloting the big engine labeled Q636. They had heard reports about a driverless train on their radio, but had no idea where it was. Just then a dispatcher’s voice jarred them: “Q636, you need to get into a siding ASAP!”

  The nearest siding was ten miles straight ahead. Knowlton stiffened. He glanced at his young, sandy-haired conductor. Both men wore jeans and short-sleeve shirts, safety glasses and steel-toed work boots. “Hey, kid, you know what we’re doing?” asked the wiry, 28-year veteran.

  Forson, tall and strongly built, had only 14 months with the railroad and just two riding with Knowlton—but he knew. “Yeah,” he said, swallowing hard, “we’re racing against something head-on.”

  The radio squawked again. “636, get into the siding now!”

  * * *

  Fighting their way through traffic in Bowling Green, Jon Hosfeld and his co-worker Mike Smith made it back to the interstate. They darted around cars at speeds up to 95 m.p.h. Finally they spotted the runaway off to their left—vapor streaming from its exhaust stacks, its brakes squealing. It was under full power. “Look at that S.O.B. go!” Hosfeld said.

  * * *

  Jess Knowlton nervously nudged the throttle on Q636 to the eighth notch—full out. The engine was howling. If they popped over a hill and hit the runaway, it was all over. But minutes later, steel squealing against steel, he ran his train onto the siding—15 m.p.h. over the speed limit. As they ground to a stop, Knowlton took a deep breath and blew it out slowly.

  Moments later a call came from the dispatcher. He asked that they secure their cars, disconnect their locomotive and move it to the north end of the mile-and-a-half-long siding. Then came a final appeal: “Once the runaway goes by, you’ve got to go after it.”

  That’s insane! Jess Knowlton thought. But he also saw the logic. His engine was the only thing that could stop the runaway before it barreled into Kenton.

  Knowlton keyed his microphone. “We understand,” he answered simply—but his body was surging with adrenaline.

  Waiting for the runaway, Knowlton used his cell phone to call his wife, Hollie. He didn’t have time to explain, he said. Just turn on the news. “This may be the last time we talk.” And he told her goodbye.

  Forson overheard the conversation and wondered if he should call home. Then it was too late. The earth began to shake, and the two trainmen heard the bellowing roar of a 3000-horse, diesel-powered locomotive. Knowlton and Forson turned to one another. “Good God!” they said in unison. They, too, had been expecting a string of coasting cars, not a train running at full throttle. Stopping a coasting train would have been challenge enough. This monster was racing south at almost 50 m.p.h. Stopping that was unimaginable.

  * * *

  Alerted by railroad officials, law enforcement agencies established roadblocks at dozens of crossings in four counties. Evacuations in Kenton were already underway, and Jon Hosfeld and Mike Smith abandoned their chase to speed directly there.

  Along the line, the runaway had been routed through slow-speed sidings in the hope that it would derail in an unpopulated area. Three times it had overrun the switch and plowed back onto the main line. At one point railway workers rushed out and set a portable derailing device onto the track. The 50-pound wedge-shaped chunk of steel worked on trains traveling at slow speeds. But the racing locomotive hit the derailer, kicked the device aside like a roller skate and sped on toward Kenton.

  * * *

  As the runaway shook past them, Knowlton and Forson jumped into action. Knowlton stood at the throttle facing a network of gauges and levers. Forson was at his side, coordinating switch alignments with the radio dispatcher. When they were back on the main line, the dispatcher gave them the order: “Go catch it!”

  They had about ten minutes before the runaway hit the downhill curve into Kenton. Knowlton turned around to look backward out a narrow window—the engine housing blocked half his view. Yet the entire chase would have to be done in reverse. On right-hand curves, he’d be blinded completely. Forson would have to guide him.

  Of course, he’d operated in reverse thousands of times in rail yards, on straight track, inching along. Never at speeds approaching 70 m.p.h. No one had ever done that. But now he shoved the throttle forward to the eighth notch.

  As the 190-ton locomotive gathered speed, Forson darted outside down the narrow gangway that ran the length of the engine and took a position on the rear platform. From there, he’d give Knowlton arm signals about turns and the approach to the runaway. The train was shaking so badly he had to grab the waist-high railing with both hands and spread his feet wide just to keep his balance.

  For safety, the rule book said that without cars attached, a locomotive the size of Knowlton’s wasn’t to exceed 30 m.p.h. It was too prone to derailment. But rules were useless now. The runaway was about two miles ahead. They would have to catch it before it went another six.

  In less than two minutes, Jess Knowlton pushed Q636 to over 65 m.p.h. He had about four minutes until they hit the downhill. The massive locomotive heaved from rail to rail. If it came off the tracks, there was little chance of survival.

  Three minutes left. Knowlton leaned on the whistle as they blew through one road crossing after another. At this speed, he would never be able to stop if a car pulled into his path. He pressed so hard the metal whistle handle broke off in his hand. “Damn!” he said, tossing it aside.

  They had maybe two minutes left.

  On the rear deck, the wind blasted Terry Forson. He held on with all he had, swaying 18 inches side to side as the wheel flanges caught one rail and bounced to the next. He fought to keep his focus, signaling speed changes to Knowlton, scanning the horizon.

  Just then, Forson spotted the runaway, a hopper car at its tail. The car was loaded with grain, and the rush of wind pelted his face with corn.

  They were 90 seconds from the downhill. Forson prepared for impact. He pulled himself along the railing toward Knowlton; then he sat on the steel gangway, pressed his back to the cab door and wrapped both arms around a steel pipe.

  Knowlton deftly inched Q636 closer. Here we go, he thought. The gap between the two trains narrowed quickly. Too quickly! They were moving at ten times the normal coupling speed. If they hit too hard, they would knock the hopper car from the track, derail the train and plow straight into it.

  They had less than a minute. Knowlton eased off the throttle and tapped the brakes, slowing to 50. Then 40. Two car lengths away now. “Easy. Easy…”

  Thirty seconds.

  Wham! The impact was jarring, but not catastrophic. But had they coupled?

  Forson jumped to his feet and hurried back to hi
s post on the rear deck. He signaled thumbs-up to Knowlton. The coupling was good.

  He eased off the throttle and tapped the brakes… Wham!

  Now what? Knowlton wondered. The two engines were in a tug of war, with 47 cars between them. If just one coupling in the string snapped, they’d all fly off the rails.

  Knowlton let the trains settle, easing the slack between cars as Forson returned to the cab. He then applied full dynamic braking, a process akin to reverse thrust on a jet engine. The effect was almost immediate. The runaway slowed to 30 m.p.h., 20… 10.

  Then just as suddenly, the speed began to climb again. The great mass of the runaway was pulling them over the crest onto the downhill track. The speed jumped to 15, then 20 m.p.h.

  Knowlton leaned on the brake levers. At 22 m.p.h., he felt them grab again. He had no hope of stopping the runaway completely—not with its throttle wide open. But if he could slow it enough to get safely through Kenton, perhaps someone could scramble aboard and shut it down.

  Seconds later they rounded the first bend into Kenton—and there below was the fuel depot. Knowlton checked his speed. It was just under the maximum for the curve.

  * * *

  Waiting at the other end of town, Jon Hosfeld stood in the middle of a blocked-off road crossing. He knew he’d get only one chance at this. As a much younger man, he’d often leapt aboard slow-moving trains in rail yards. But at 12 m.p.h., this train wasn’t creeping and he was 52 years old.

  The train was bearing directly down on him now, its engine still howling. As it swept past, Hosfeld took two quick side steps, reached for the railing with both hands and kicked up his left foot.

  In that instant, he was jerked from the pavement. His foot caught a step, and he hoisted himself onto the platform. Then he scrambled inside the locomotive and jammed the throttle off.

  * * *

  At the opposite end of the train, Jess Knowlton felt the power come down immediately. “It’s over,” he said to Forson, “… nobody’s hurt.”

  They powered down Q636, set all three braking systems and, totally exhausted, exited their cab. They had done the unimaginable—caught, coupled and stopped a runaway train. And saved the town of Kenton.

  Originally published in the March 2002 issue of Reader’s Digest magazine.

  Jon Hosfeld, Terry Forson and Jess Knowlton all served as advisors for the 2010 movie “Unstoppable,” which was based on the CSX incident. Hosfeld and Knowlton are retired from the railroad. Forson still works for CSX and advocates for train safety.

  • YOUR TRUE STORIES •

  FOLLOWING DIRECTIONS

  I looked away settling in a lounge chair, and it happened. Stephen, my four-year-old son, disappeared. He was playing in a swimming pool one moment, then he was missing. I scanned the water more carefully. No Stephen. I asked the lifeguard, who shook her head. Only a mother could react with the intense panic that flooded me. For 25 minutes, I searched frantically for a boy in a red swimsuit. Then I noticed an announcement being repeated. “If you are looking for a lost child, come to the courtesy booth.” I reached the booth breathless, and noticed Stephen seated, leafing through a brochure. He looked up. “Mom! Where have you been?” he demanded. “Don’t you remember telling me to come here if I couldn’t find you? Well? Here I am!!!” I shook my head. If only I could follow directions as well as Stephen.

  —JoAnn Cohen Havertown, Pennsylvania

  AN EVEN SWAP

  When I got engaged in my early 20s, my wife-to-be was a soft-spoken young lady who rarely raised her voice or spouted off a retort regardless of the often snarky remarks I made about one thing or another. One day, I asked her why WE got engaged but SHE got a diamond ring. She said, “Well, you’re getting me.” I said, “But you’re getting me!” “Right,” she replied, just as calm as you please, “and you had to put up a diamond ring to make it an even swap.”

  —CA Hamilton Aurora, Illinois

  A Miracle of Mermaids

  by Margo Pfeiff

  A balloon, mermaids and kind hearts conspire to help a grieving girl.

  Rhonda Gill froze as she heard her four-year-old daughter, Desiree, sobbing quietly in the family room that morning in October 1993. Rhonda tiptoed through the doorway. The tiny dark-haired child was hugging a photograph of her father, who had died nine months earlier. Rhonda, 24, watched as Desiree gently ran her fingers around her father’s face. “Daddy,” she said softly, “why won’t you come back?”

  The petite brunette college student felt a surge of despair. It had been hard enough coping with her husband Ken’s death, but her daughter’s grief was more than she could bear. If only I could tear the pain out of her, Rhonda thought.

  Ken Gill and Rhonda Hill of Yuba City, California, had met when Rhonda was 18, and had married after a whirlwind courtship. Their daughter, Desiree, was born on January 9, 1989.

  Although a muscular six feet, three inches tall, Ken was a gentle man whom everyone loved. His big passion was his daughter. “She’s a real daddy’s girl,” Rhonda would often say as Ken’s eyes twinkled with pride. Father and daughter went everywhere together: hiking, dune-buggy riding and fishing for bass and salmon on the Feather River.

  Instead of gradually adjusting to her father’s death, Desiree had refused to accept it. “Daddy will be home soon,” she would tell her mother. “He’s at work.” When she played with her toy telephone, she pretended she was chatting with him. “I miss you, Daddy,” she’d say. “When will you come back?”

  After Ken’s death, Rhonda moved from her apartment in Yuba City to her mother’s home in nearby Live Oak. Seven weeks after the funeral, Desiree was still inconsolable. “I just don’t know what to do,” Rhonda told her mother, Trish Moore, a 47-year-old medical assistant.

  One evening the three of them sat outside, gazing at the stars over the Sacramento Valley. “See that one, Desiree?” Her grandmother pointed at a bright speck near the horizon. “That’s your daddy shining down from heaven.” Several nights later Rhonda woke to find Desiree on the doorstep in her pajamas, weeping as she sought her daddy’s star. Twice they took her to a child therapist, but nothing seemed to help.

  As a last resort, Trish took Desiree to Ken’s grave. The child laid her head against his gravestone and said, “Maybe if I listen hard enough I can hear Daddy talk to me.”

  “How about if we tie a letter to a balloon and send it up to heaven?”

  Then one evening, as Rhonda tucked her child in, Desiree announced, “I want to die, Mommy, so I can be with Daddy.” God help me, Rhonda prayed. What more can I possibly do?

  * * *

  November 8, 1993, would have been Ken’s 29th birthday. “How will I send him a card?” Desiree asked her grandmother.

  “How about if we tie a letter to a balloon,” Trish said, “and send it up to heaven?” Desiree’s eyes immediately lit up.

  On their way to the cemetery, the back seat of the car full of flowers for their planned gravesite visit, the three stopped at a store. “Help Mom pick out a balloon,” Trish instructed. At a rack where dozens of helium-filled silver Mylar balloons bobbed, Desiree made an instant decision: “That one!” Happy Birthday was emblazoned above a drawing of the Little Mermaid from the Disney film. Desiree and her father had often watched the video together.

  The child’s eyes shone as they arranged flowers on Ken’s grave. It was a beautiful day, with a slight breeze rippling the eucalyptus trees. Then Desiree dictated a letter to her dad. “Tell him ‘Happy Birthday. I love you and miss you,’ ” she rattled off. “ ‘I hope you get this and can write me on my birthday in January.’ ”

  Trish wrote the message and their address on a small piece of paper, which was then wrapped in plastic and tied to the end of the string on the balloon. Finally Desiree released the balloon.

  For almost an hour they watched the shining spot of silver grow ever smaller. “Okay,” Trish said at last. “Time to go home.” Rhonda and Trish were beginning to walk slowly from the grave when t
hey heard Desiree shout excitedly, “Did you see that? I saw Daddy reach down and take it!” The balloon, visible just moments earlier, had disappeared. “Now Dad’s going to write me back,” Desiree declared.

  * * *

  On a cold, rainy November morning on Prince Edward Island in eastern Canada, 32-year-old Wade MacKinnon pulled on his waterproof duck-hunting gear. MacKinnon, a forest ranger, lived with his wife and three children in Mermaid, a rural community a few miles east of Charlottetown.

  But instead of driving to the estuary where he usually hunted, he suddenly decided to go to Mermaid Lake, two miles away. Leaving his pickup, he hiked past dripping spruce and pine and soon entered a cranberry bog surrounding the 23-acre lake. In the bushes on the shoreline, something fluttered and caught his eye. Curious, he approached to find a silver balloon snagged in the branches of a thigh-high bayberry bush. Printed on one side was a picture of a mermaid. When he untangled the string, he found a soggy piece of paper at the end of it, wrapped in plastic.

  At home, MacKinnon carefully removed the wet note, allowing it to dry. When his wife, Donna, came home later, he said, “Look at this,” and showed her the balloon and note. Intrigued, she read: “November 8, 1993. Happy Birthday, Daddy.…” It finished with a mailing address in Live Oak, California.

  “It’s only November 12,” Wade exclaimed. “This balloon traveled 3,000 miles in four days!”

  “And look,” said Donna, turning the balloon over. “This is a Little Mermaid balloon, and it landed at Mermaid Lake.”

  “We have to write to Desiree,” Wade said. “Maybe we were chosen to help this little girl.” But he could see that his wife didn’t feel the same way. With tears in her eyes, Donna stepped away from the balloon. “Such a young girl having to deal with death—it’s awful,” she said.