Amtrak 21, the southbound Texas Eagle, derailed 2 of its 7 cars near Higginson, Arkansas shortly after 3 a.m. Wednesday, January 6, 2010. Higginson is about 60 miles north of Little Rock on the Union Pacific's busy double-track line to St. Louis.  There were 212 passengers on the train and 14 crew members. All were eventually bused to points south in Arkansas and Texas to San Antonio. Passengers going to Los Angeles were put on the Sunset Limited at San Antonio. There were no injuries reported. It was a media event with coverage on all local TV stations and even CNN. The way I look at it, since no one was injured, at least people now realize that a passenger train serves this area. After all, the Texas Eagle usually comes through Little Rock at midnight and 3 a.m. and nobody sees it, sort of 'out of sight-out of mind.'

Here are some photos taken by JOHN C. JONES, official Union Pacific photographer in Arkansas and he is also an Arkansas Railroad Club member. John's email address is: johnphotonut@att.net


9:40 a.m. looking south. The two cars that derailed were right behind the Sightseer Lounge. The last car on the train did not derail.


A freight squeezes by at 9:50 a.m. UP ran numerous northbound freights on the second of two main lines.


Passengers being de-boarded at 9:55 a.m. It was in the teens temperature-wise. As information, snow was forecast for Wednesday night with temperatures falling to single digits by Thursday night and wind chills 10 below zero by Friday morning.


From Highway 367, one of the buses is loading passengers at 10:09 a.m.


Looking north. Amtrak 21 usually only has one locomotive, but today it had two headed by No.193. It had 7 cars, but I do not know the consist at this time since I didn't take the pictures.


Closeup of a wheelset of one of the derailed coaches at 10:58 a.m.


Cranes came from Memphis and started to re-rail the cars at 11:24 a.m.


11:35 a.m.




11:51 a.m.




12:05 p.m.




Amtrak 193 plus the second unit and 5 of the 7 cars at Union Station at 2:40 p.m. on its way to Fort Worth, to become the northbound No. 22 on January 7.

Again, all photos by JOHN C. JONES.

To contact me, email to thundertrain@gmail.com

(Ken Ziegenbein)