Metra Menance

Today while coming back from work we had a major train delay. It all started with the innocuous announcement that BNSF trains are delayed by 5 to 10 mins. Then the train started after 20 min delay from chicago union station. Before hindsdale it came to a complete halt. And they didn't give any time frame. Fortunately we had our PSP with us and Dhevi started playing the Burnout Legends for the first time. She is really hooked. Even after going home she continued to play for 1 hour.

Anyway the metra guys left us in the hindsdale station at around 6:20 and asked us to arrange our own transportation. Dhevi was hungry ( as usual? ) and we roamed the Hindsdale city near the railway station for a while. There was a live music event and the train crowd added more effect to the whole scene. Ed called American taxi and they told they have sent ALL the available taxi's towards the station and asked to getinto the first one we see. Given the crowd it is impossible to get one. So we went to a Chineese ( ? Dragon ) place and had our dinner. At 8:15 we came out and got one of the taxi's and came home.

Here's Chicago tribune on the incident.

A Metra train line was shut down this evening after several bags of a white acid powder fell from a freight train along tracks in the western suburbs.

Trains along the BNSF line were halted in both directions after between 6 and 10 40-pound bags of the substance were discovered along the tracks between the Main Street and Belmont Road Stations in Downers Grove around 4:30 p.m., authorities said.

The powder also was found on the tracks at various places between Naperville and Brookfield, Metra spokeswoman Judy Pardonnet said. Authorities are not calling the powder suspicious and no injuries were reported.

Pardonnet said it's highly unlikely that service along the train line will continue this evening. She said commuters who are stranded in downtown Chicago this evening should consider taking Union Pacific West line trains to West Chicago.

From there, they should board a shuttle bus that will go to the Illinois Highway 59 BNSF station, located on the Aurora/Naperville border. The I-59 station, where many commuters park their vehicles, is the second-to-last stop on the BNSF line.

A hazardous materials team from The Downers Grove Fire Department and representatives from the Environmental Protection Agency are examining the substance found in Downers Grove, said Doug Kozlowski, a Downers Grove spokesman.

In Clarendon Hills, firefighters found a bag of powdered stearic acid along tracks on Gilbert Avenue about 6 p.m., according to a firefighter from the suburb.

Around 6:30 p.m., a bag of the same substance was found along tracks near the Prairie Avenue crossing in Brookfield, said Brookfield Fire Department Capt. Edward Bermann.

Pardonnet could not confirm whether that was the same substance found on tracks elsewhere.

Inbound Metra trains were stopped as of 8:15 p.m., while outbound trains were operating, Kozlowski said.

The substance is not hazardous and is an ingredient in making candles, said BNSF Railway spokesman Steve Forsberg. "At most it can be an irritant," he said.

BNSF workers were picking up the bags containing the substance tonight, Forsberg said.

The train that the bags fell from originated in Tacoma, Wash. and its destination was Cicero, he said.

"How the container came to be open is under investigation," Forsberg said.

He did not know what the train was hauling.