Lutherville Residents Rescue Elderly Driver From Light Rail Collision

Two Lutherville men rescued an elderly driver from his car after he had accidentally turned the vehicle onto the light rail tracks in Monday night’s fog.

The car was struck by a southbound light rail train just minutes after the two men helped the driver out of the vehicle, which had become stuck on the tracks.

The heroic actions took place shortly before 8:30 p.m. after the 83-year-old Baltimore man mistakenly turned his car onto the tracks that parallel Riderwood Drive near the intersection of West Seminary Avenue.

"We were like, 'Man, you got to get out of the car, you got to get out of the car,’” said Scott Dunn, who helped the unidentified driver out of the car with the assistance of his neighbor.

Dunn had been driving home after picking up a package of dog food Monday night when he noticed two cars in peculiar places. The first car, parked along the right shoulder of Riderwood Drive near the intersection of West Seminary Avenue, belonged to his neighbor Steve. The second car was parked on the light rail tracks.

Dunn drove about 20 yards past his neighbor before realizing something was wrong.

"I came around, saw the car on the tracks—I thought it was a cop because of the ones that have the rail tires. I thought it was a cop at first because it didn't make any sense [for another vehicle to be on the tracks]," Dunn said in an interview with Patch as he stood near the intersection watching police check for debris on the tracks. "It hadn't really registered. I'm driving. And then I saw the smoke from the tires. It was at that point I noticed that there was someone in trouble in the car. Then it clicked."

Dunn and his neighbor sprang from their cars and ran toward the Buick, its driver still struggling to unhinge the vehicle from the rails.

Dunn said he remembered feeling that there was no sense of danger—at first.

Three minutes later, his notion of safety proved false. A train was approaching.

"We tried pulling him out. He had a cane. He couldn't walk real good, so we just started walking [with him]," Dunn said. "It didn't seem like there was really any danger because you can see pretty far down the track, so you can see if it's coming. We just took our time and walked this way [along the tracks] because there's a gully there and he would've probably fallen if he would've tried to come through there."

MTA spokesman Terry Owens told WBAL Radio that the driver "became disoriented in fog." You can listen to the audio interview with WBAL here.

The three men were nearing a natural crossing point—a more solid piece of earth—closer to the roadway intersection when red lights began flashing, bells began ringing and two crossing barriers lowered.

"It was like it wasn't anything. We were just walking. It seemed like we had plenty of time. Plenty of time," Dunn said. "And then once we got to here [about 40 feet away] we realized we didn't have plenty of time. We had just enough time."

Dunn and the others were fearful that the train was going to hit the car and send it or its pieces veering toward them.

"I thought we were going to get hit by like, something, like shrapnel," Dunn said. "I thought the car was going to come this way. But it was not what I thought it was going to be."

The conductor of the train managed to slam on the "mushroom"—an emergency stop button, as she described it to Dunn, just in time to smash into the Buick, but not so forcefully as to knock it off the tracks. No one was injured.

Had the Buick shaken loose and veered slightly to the right, Dunn said he and his neighbor and the 83-year-old man could have been in trouble.

"We had exactly the right amount of time," Dunn said. "Then I just started breaking down. It was crazy. I was having problems talking. It just felt very strange."

Police continued blocking off the intersection for about and hour and a half, diverting traffic while they examined the track for debris.

At about 9:30 p.m. Dunn said he was in disbelief that cars were once again traversing the intersection "like nothing happened."

No one, including passengers on the train was injured.