Head-On in the Tunnel: A Fatal Collision Beneath Olympia
Two Northern Pacific trains met inside the Olympia tunnel, killing Engineer Warren of Tacoma and wrecking freight cars and tunnel roof.
Olympia.—Two trains entered opposite ends of a block at the same instant, and Engineer Warren, of Tacoma, received fatal injuries in a head-on collision here Saturday afternoon at the east portion of the Olympia tunnel on the Northern Pacific. Warren's engine cab was demolished, two cars of shingles were telescoped, two cars of lumber piled up, and about 50 feet of the roof of the tunnel destroyed.
“Two trains entered opposite ends of a block at the same instant and Engineer Warren, of Tacoma, received fatal injuries in a head-on collision here Saturday afternoon.”
The Northern Pacific's Olympia tunnel was part of the region's main north-south rail artery, and a head-on block collision was exactly the kind of disaster that signaling rules were meant to prevent. Modern readers still recognize the stakes: a single operational failure can kill a worker and snarl a corridor used by thousands.
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