Cheer up buckeroo.

Anything relating to Casey Jones is certainly worth some overkill. I thought locomotives were now equipped with "dead-man" switches that keep them from going anywhere if no one is in the driver's seat, so to speak. That's what I get for being an autodidact. I do think, though I will hate myself for venting such pettiness, that "at the throttle" is going to have to replace "behind the wheel" as a description of where said engineer was or wasn't.

There was a previous case of an engineer and a fireman (when there were such) both having medical problems and the train going off an open drawbridge. Also a noted runaway about 1880 or so on the 'Grapevine.' They went to fill the engine with water, leaving the cars on the mainline right on Tehachapi summit. The wind, believe it or not, started the train rolling downhill. One brakeman had left his post; the other one stopped part of the train but three cars broke free and eventually derailed with fatal results. Don't know if anybody wrote songs about either of those cases either, so there is definitely a backlog.

By the way, where was this?? CC