Book!

Some of you know that I am working on a book about the 2005 Metrolink train wreck in Glendale, California. Briefly, this was the crash caused by Juan Manuel Alvarez, who parked his Jeep Grand Cherokee on the tracks near the Chevy Chase crossing on January 26th, 2005. He claimed that he was distraught and wanted to commit suicide. But he changed his mind at the last moment and leaped out of the way. He then stood by and watched as the tragedy that he put into play unfolded in that misty, dark morning.

It was a perfect storm, of sorts. Metrolink 100, traveling toward downtown Los Angeles with about 250 passengers on their morning commute, struck the Jeep, and immediately derailed. It plowed forward though the front end of the cab car had fallen off the tracks. The out of control train then ran head on into the locomotive of a freight train that was parked on a storage track known as the Glendale slide. The impact caused Metrolink 100 to buckle right into the path of oncoming Metrolink 91, which was carrying commuting passengers out of the city.

In the end, three trains collided, eleven people died, and nearly 200 were injured. And Alvarez was convicted of eleven counts of first-degree murder and is currently serving eleven consecutive life sentences.

Once you peal back the wreckage left, you discover a story of love, of hate, of sorrow, of joy. Of bravery and of cowardice. It is a story about people reacting in extreme circumstances. There is a saying (and I cannot find it - thanks Google!) that says something about how difficult times do not build character. Instead, they reveal it. I think that is true in the case of this horrendous time in hundreds of people's lives.