Blue Line L hits deer near Cumberland

[GojiMet86]

Blue Line L hits deer near Cumberland

 

D’oh — a deer!

 

That’s the thought that likely went through the mind of a CTA train driver early Wednesday when a Blue Line train fatally struck the creature just east of the Cumberland station.

 

The outbound train was a couple of hundred feet east of the station when it hit the deer about 3:15 a.m., CTA spokeswoman Catherine Hoskinski said.

 

Though deer wander onto the tracks and are hit about twice a year, the accidents typically happen on the suburban Yellow Line near Skokie — not on a city section of the Blue Line sandwiched on either side by the four-lane Kennedy Expy., officials said.

 

The deer likely headed for the bright lights of downtown after hopping a fence from the Catherine Chevalier Woods half a mile away.

 

To reach the tracks, it would have had to have ridden its luck playing a real-life game of Frogger, dodging speeding cars that pass every 3.5 seconds even at 3 a.m. on a Wednesday, Illinois Department of Transportation spokesman Guy Tridgell said.

 

It then likely skipped over a 32-inch barrier onto the tracks just north of River Road and hobbled east along the Blue Line through the Rosemont and Cumberland stations before it was hit.

 

Nobody on the train was hurt and the Blue Line resumed service 13 minutes later after workers removed the carcass, Hoskinski said.

 

Amalgamated Transit Union local 308 president Robert Kelly, who represents L drivers, said animals that make it onto the tracks are typically electrocuted on the third rail before they are hit.

 

Larger deer can cause a derailment, but a driver can stop the train within 50 feet by engaging the emergency brakes, he said.

 

If a live deer does make it in front of an oncoming train at night, Kelly added, it acts like, well, “a deer caught in the headlights.”

 

 

Has the New York City subway ever had an incident like this?

[FamousNYLover]

That pictures are hard to see.

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