DEPUTIES ON TRACK RACING TRAIN DEADLY, MOTORISTS REMINDED.

Byline: Amy Raisin Staff Writer

NEWHALL - A team of sheriff's deputies joined forces with Metrolink on Thursday and rode the rails in search of drivers and pedestrians who attempted to ``beat the train'' - a gamble that has claimed nearly 6,000 lives across the country in the past dozen years.

Los Angeles County sheriff's deputies from the Santa Clarita station, positioned at predetermined railroad crossings along San Fernando and Soledad Canyon roads, issued citations to 25 drivers and one pedestrian during the Officer-On-A-Train program.

``It's really simple. You have to be on the railroad tracks illegally to get hit by a train,'' said Jim McInerney, a safety coordinator with the California Public Utilities Commission.

Deputy Mark Slater rode with the engineer and communicated with his motorcycle colleagues via radio from his elevated vantage point, the perfect place to see just how many people place themselves in danger every day.

The exercise was scheduled before the fatal Jan. 6 collision in Burbank that derailed a Metrolink train that had left from Santa Clarita. The driver of a pickup truck who tried to cross the tracks ahead of the train died, as did a train passenger, Grace Midgley Kirkness, 76, of Newhall.

Tom McDougall, an Amtrak locomotion engineer, said Thursday that he experiences a near-collision with a vehicle or a pedestrian at least once every trip.

``This train can go 79 miles per hour. It's an optical illusion. They can't tell how fast I'm going,'' McDougall said. ``Nine out of 10 times they can't tell how fast this train is moving. That's a serious problem.''

It can take a train traveling at 55 mph more than one mile - the equivalent of 18 football fields - to stop after the engineer applies the emergency brakes.

The veteran engineer said public-awareness programs, such as the one sponsored by Operation Lifesaver and the Southern California Rail Safety Team on Thursday, have helped decrease the number of tragedies.

In a multitasking age of cell phones and other in-car gadgets, drivers are not always on a mission to beat the train past the crossing: A number of crashes result from a driver's failure to stop behind the white lines.

Trains are three feet wider than the tracks on each side, according to statistics provided by Operation Lifesaver, a national nonprofit education program.

While it is illegal for pedestrians to cross the tracks outside ofdesignated crossings, many people, including one man who was issued a warning Thursday, are unaware that walking along railroad rights-of-way is prohibited.

``People will walk their dogs, or they'll have headphones on, and they don't even hear the train coming,'' Slater said.

In 2001, more than 530 people were killed and more than 400 injured nationwide while trespassing on the rights-of-way.

As of Jan. 1 this year, a ticket for trespassing or vehicle violations on the tracks in California costs the offender $321, Slater said.

For more information about the Officer-On-A-Train program and Operation Lifesaver, call [phone] or log on to www.oli.org.

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3 photos

Photo:

(1 -- color) Sheriff's Deputy Mark Slater rides in a Metrolink engineer's booth Thursday and radios to motorcycle officers when car drivers or pedestrians endanger themselves on the rails.

(2 -- color) Sheriff's deputies question a pedestrian who wandered across train tracks Thursday. Deputies issued 25 citations - most of them to car drivers - for violating rail right-of-way.

(3) A Metrolink train pulls into the Newhall rail station Thursday during an Officer-On-A-Train safety program.

David R. Crane/Staff Photographer