Seaboard Coast Line R. Co. v. Helman, 75--148
| Decision Date | 23 April 1976 |
| Docket Number | No. 75--148,75--148 |
| Citation | 330 So.2d 761 |
| Parties | SEABOARD COAST LINE RAILROAD COMPANY and William A. Cagle, Appellants, v. Linda S. HELMAN, Appellee. |
| Court | Florida District Court of Appeals |
Frederick J. Ward of Giles, Hedrick & Robinson, P.A., Orlando, for appellants.
James O. Driscoll of Driscoll, Conrad, Langston & Layton, P.A., Orlando, and Gordon V. Frederick Sanford, for appellee.
This is a personal injury action arising out of a railroad crossing collision between appellants' train and the vehicle in which plaintiff was a passenger. The jury trial resulted in a verdict and judgment adverse to defendants/appellants.
Plaintiff/appellee tried this case on three theories of negligence on the part of the defendants in the operation of the train at the crossing: (1) defendants operated the train at an excessive speed under the circumstances; (2) defendants failed to give warning of the train's approach, or a warning which was adequate under the circumstances; and (3) defendants failed to maintain a lookout or failed to maintain a proper lookout under the circumstances. Appellants' primary contention is that the evidence is legally insufficient to sustain a finding of negligence in any of these respects as the proximate cause of the collision and the plaintiff's resulting injuries and damages. Having reviewed the evidence relative to the negligence issues in a light most favorable to appellee, we conclude that appellants' point is well taken and that the court erred in not granting appellants' motion for directed verdict at the close of all of the evidence.
The collision under which this suit arose occurred at 8:05 p.m. on August 26, 1972, at the intersection of State Road 431, a paved two-lane highway running in a north and south direction, and a branch line track of appellant-railroad which at that point runs in an east-west direction. This is in an unincorporated area of Seminole County, Florida. The weather was cloudy with slight drizzling rain falling, dusk, but not yet dark. Appellants' train, consisting of the engine, seven cars and caboose, was eastbound. Plaintiff was a passenger in a 1969 Ford pickup truck operated by her husband, Larry Helman, southbound on State Road 431. In the northwest quadrant of the intersection of the road and the track was a residence surrounded by trees and shrubbery, so located that a southbound motorist would have his view of eastbound trains obstructed until he was within seventy-five feet of the crossing. Mr. Helman had entered State Road 431 approximately a half a mile north of the railroad crossing, and from that point had driven south to the point of collission at a speed of approximately forth miles per hour. The window on the passenger side of the truck's cab was up, the windshield wipers were on, the defroster on, and the lights on low beam. Although Mr. Helman was familiar with the road and well aware of the railroad crossing which he was then approaching, he neither heard nor saw the train until he was on or nearly on the track, an instant before the collision. The left front of the engine struck the right front and side of the truck. Appellee, Linda Helman, had no recollection of the accident or of the events immediately preceding it.
We consider first the evidence relating to the alleged lack or inadequacy of warning given by appellant as the train approached the crossing. Since the crossing was well marked (indeed, Mr. Helman was thoroughly familiar with it) and since the dual headlights on the engine were on bright intensity, plaintiff's claim of lack or inadequacy of warning apparently relates solely to the audible warning system.
There was the not unexpected testimony of the train crew. The engineer testified that when the train was approximately one thousand feet west of the crossing, he turned on the automatic bell as one of his warning signals and that it was in continuous operation thereafter to the time of the collision. At the same time, so he said, he commenced the warning air horn signal consisting of two long blasts, a short blast, and a long blast with a pause between each, and he continued to blow the horn in this fashion with maximum intensity up to the time of impact. The brakeman, riding in the engine on the left side, substantially corroborated the engineer's testimony.
There was the testimony of disinterested witnesses. Mr. Marvin Motes, operating a pickup truck northbound on State Road 431, was about fifty yards south of the crossing when he both saw and heard the train approaching from the west. When he brought his vehicle to a stop on the south side of the crossing, the train was then approximately a hundred yards west of the crossing with the horn blowing intermittently. The window of his truck was down but the radio was playing. After Mr. Motes had come to a stop, he observed some three hundred fifty feet north of the crossing the vehicle driven by the witness Susan Thomas (hereafter discussed), and he then observed at about the same distance the Helman vehicle on State Road 431, approaching the crossing from the north. He continued to observe the Helman vehicle up until the collision, during which time the train's horn was being blown intermittently. Susan Thomas was on First Street, approximately three hundred fifty feet north on the crossing, and had stopped at the intersection with State Road 431 to allow the southbound Helman vehicle to pass. Miss Thomas had her window down and heard the train horn blow two or three times from the time the Helmans passed her up to the time of the collision. Morris Hansen, whose residence was on the west side of State Road 431 approximately one-half mile north of the railroad crossing, testified that he was in his house with the windows closed and watching a television program when he heard the train horn blow at least three long blasts for the State Road 431 crossing.
Against this positive testimony of two train crew members and three disinterested witnesses, plaintiff pitted the Negative testimony of Mr. Helman that he did not hear a train horn, and the negative testimony of the train's conductor, riding in the caboose, that he did not hear the train horn.
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