The Kew Gardens Train Wreck

On the evening of November 22, 1950, a Long Island Rail Road train bound for Hempstead stopped dead on the Main Line between Kew Gardens and Jamaica when its air brakes locked and would not release. The brakeman stepped out with a red lantern to flag following trains, but hearing the traction motors still running, he wrongly assumed the brakes had freed themselves, switched off his lantern, and climbed back aboard. Four minutes behind, a Babylon-bound train carrying about 1,200 rush-hour riders slowed for a Go Slow signal, then its engineer read the next signal as All Clear and pushed back up to 35 miles an hour. It slammed into the stalled train's rear car, telescoping it and killing everyone riding in it. Seventy-eight people died and 363 were hurt, on one of the busiest travel nights of the year.