East Millinocket man escapes major injury in train collision

LONG A TOWNSHIP – Ron Purcell expects to be buying lots of lottery tickets the next few days, and if you happen to see him, rub him for good luck or allow him to bless your lucky rabbit’s foot.

Purcell, 57, of East Millinocket, was driving his Ford F-150 pickup truck on Cedar Lake Road at about 2 p.m. Thursday when it collided with a more than 20-car freight locomotive hauling wood and paper products south on the Montreal, Maine & Atlantic Railway line.

With Purcell hanging on for dear life, the engine’s right front fender caught the left fender of his pickup truck and spun the pickup into a pile of heavy wooden railroad ties near the tracks, he said.

With the truck’s front end already demolished, each railroad car tore into the back of the pickup, throwing Purcell around in the cab and driving the pickup farther into the wood pile until the last of the cars passed by.

Purcell was able to shove open the driver’s side door and walk away with only a cut on his head, a cut on his left shoulder, and lots of bruises down the left side of his body.

He knows he is one lucky guy.

“Every time I turn around, I am just feeling the aches,” Purcell said Thursday with quiet but rueful emphasis. “After everything stopped and the train stopped, I walked around and kissed the ground, just about, and said ‘Wow.’

“It’s just the grace of God and good luck that I didn’t get killed.”

The 1992 Ford is a different matter, said Clint Linscott, owner of Linscott’s Auto Body of East Millinocket, which towed the truck – or what’s left of it – from the accident scene.

“It’s all over. It’s everywhere. It’s bumper to bumper,” Linscott said of the damage. “‘Demolished’ is the only word you could use. That truck is demolished.

“The accident shows one thing: Those trains sure don’t stop on a dime.”

Purcell and Penobscot County Deputy Sheriff David Duplisea, who is investigating, said they suspect a heavy factor in the accident was the slush-covered ice near the railroad crossing, which has at least one stop sign but no crossing lights or guards.

“It’s a private crossing,” Duplisea said. “You see a lot of those up this way.”

The train, which was held at the scene for about two hours, was undamaged, Duplisea said.

Purcell said he saw the train coming around the long and gentle curve and braked but still managed to slide close enough to the tracks to catch the train. He said he never heard any train whistle but quickly acknowledged that this doesn’t mean the whistle didn’t sound.

He had been on his way to check his camp on the lake, he said.

Last year, there were six incidents involving trains. In those accidents, one person was killed and one person injured, according to Maine Operation Lifesaver, a nonprofit organization that promotes increasing safety at railroad crossings.

Duplisea could not yet say whether Purcell would be charged, but he seemed to doubt it. Purcell found irony in his having stopped at an auto dealership to look at new pickup trucks just before the accident.

“I wasn’t really sure I wanted one. Now I guess I’ll have to buy one,” he said. “I won’t get much of a trade-in, though.”