Now it’s raising much-needed funds for the Royal Flying Doctor Services of Australia. When discussing work, a group of mates came up with the idea to cross 3000km of desert from Adelaide to Darwin on a Kalamazoo – a hand-powered railcar.

The group of 10 men taking part in the “Kalamazoo Crossing”, which includes The Advertiser’s photographic manager Mike Burton and investigations editor Bryan Littlely, set out on their two-week journey on July 24.

“The idea to cross Australia by Kalamazoo began as something of a joke 10 years ago. Then we got tired of people telling us it couldn’t be done,” Mr Littlely said.

“So we’ve set out to prove the knockers wrong in typical Aussie style and to raise money for a great cause in the Royal Flying Doctor Service.”

If successful, the group of adventurous mates will set a Guinness World Record for the quickest crossing of the nation by a hand-powered rail vehicle and also the longest trip by a Kalamazoo.

RFDS spokesman Charlie Paterson said the trip was a “big call”. “Just when you thought there was nothing left to explore, Kalamazoo Crossing 2011 will break through new frontiers,” he said. Proceeds will go towards aircraft and medical equipment.

via AdelaideNow

The train which left Perth on Wednesday and was due to arrive in Adelaide on Friday was terminated and returning to Perth, the train company said in a statement on its website.

The service scheduled to depart from Adelaide for Perth on Sunday has also been cancelled.

The cancellation also affects vehicle transport on the services.

The service departing Sydney on Saturday will terminate in Adelaide and will not continue to Perth.

Indian Pacific Adelaide to Sydney services have not been affected.

A passenger told The Advertiser the cancellations were because of flooding on the rail line near Kalgoorlie.

No one was available at Great Southern Rail.

Passengers should contact Great Southern Rail on 131 147.

via AdelaideNow

SA has long battled to keep pace with the more populous eastern States and a high-speed rail network that literally leaves Adelaide out of the loop would seriously disadvantage us.

This issue and others affecting SA are examined in the SA Business Monthly lifout in The Advertiser on Tuesday.

The high-speed rail project is a long way off but just as it took many decades to go from wishful thinking to reality for the Alice Springs to Darwin rail track, a high-speed rail network linking the capitals will eventually be built.

Should Adelaide receive a high-speed rail link? Share your opinion here.

In the decades ahead, petroleum prices will soar, making car and air travel considerably more expensive. Coupled with greenhouse gas concerns, this will accelerate demand for rail as an alternative. In pushing our case, SA should enlist an unlikely ally Melbourne.

While Adelaidians frequently compare their city to Melbourne, the Victorians’ real rival is Sydney.

It should be pointed out to Melbourne that with a network extending to Adelaide, Melbourne would be a node equal to Sydney, rather than the last stop at the end of the line.

Victoria could also be sold the benefits of Horsham becoming the only stop on a Melbourne-Adelaide route. This would open up the western Victorian region that would otherwise risk becoming isolated.

SA has a proud history in the rail sector, being home to some of the most important and innovative rail organisations, such as the Australian Rail Track Corporation.

Obviously, it would cost many billions of dollars extra to include the link to Adelaide and it would not be an easy case to mount on strict profit criteria.

But if we do not get in there and stake a claim, future generations will condemn us as we get left behind when the economic benefits of the project begin to flow.

via AdelaideNow

Heavy cranes were used yesterday to put the freight train’s two engines and a carriage back on the tracks.

Freightlink says it is repairing the track and expects it to reopen this afternoon.

Its chief executive John Fullerton says southbound Ghan passengers were taken off the train last night and put up in hotels.

“The southbound Ghan has been delayed by 24 hours but that will be the first train through this afternoon when the tracks reopen,” he said.

“That’s sitting just north of Alice Springs this morning and the northbound Ghan, which is arriving into Alice Springs this morning, shouldn’t be affected at all.”

Priority freight has been taken by truck to the Top End.

via ABC News

Read more about the derailment in our forum…

They are the people who were killed in October 2002 when The Ghan train he was driving ploughed into a car and a bus queued across the busy Park Tce railway crossing at Salisbury.

Although almost eight years have passed, the trauma the Pacific National train driver suffered has not diminished.

“I still think, `I’m home to my wife every night and my kids and there’s someone sitting at home elsewhere missing a partner, or a wife or a young kid’,” the 49-year-old says. “I’ve had Christmases with my family and they’re missing theirs.

“But (psychologists and colleagues) say to you, it’s not your fault, but you still think of things like that.

“I had three months off work after that, and it still haunts me every day.”

Mr Parslow feels compelled to tell his story – and that of other train drivers – in light of last weekend’s accidental death of a two-year-old boy at Nantawarra.

The toddler had wandered away from his family’s rural property and was playing on the tracks at Nantawarra Crossing, near Port Wakefield, just after 1pm on May 22 when he was hit by a freight train unable to stop in time.

Dark memories of the Salisbury tragedy came rushing back for Mr Parslow.

He said he was immediately filled with dread when he heard about the accident.

“We left Adelaide freight terminal at 12.55pm on Saturday and we were going over the Port Wakefield bridge when the emergency call came over the radio,” he says.

“The drivers said they’d hit a young kid and automatically your heart just goes into your mouth.

“I have a 13-month-old grandchild and as soon as they said that, it just hits you.”

Mr Parslow’s story is not isolated: the trauma and grief of fatal accidents reverberate across the industry.

He estimates 20 per cent of drivers he has worked with have been involved in a serious accident at a railway crossing.

He talks about a colleague who accidentally killed a man crossing tracks two years ago. “He still hasn’t told his kids about the accident,” Mr Parslow says.

“We’ve got 48 train drivers at the Adelaide Freight Terminal, a good bunch of blokes, so when that happened on Saturday, there would have been phone calls going around making sure everyone was OK.”

He describes the feeling of helplessness drivers have just before an unavoidable accident.

“In a car, if you see someone, you can try to swerve . . . but it’s the inevitability of what’s going to happen – you’re looking at them and they’re looking at you.

“And what can we do? There is nothing else we can do except wait for it to happen.

“And then you have to deal with the process after it.”

Over his three decades of driving, Mr Parslow has been involved in eight level crossing accidents. The father of two says he still suffers physically – as well as emotionally – from the 2002 Salisbury accident, which also injured 26 people.

“I sit at home at night and my wife says, `Why are you shaking? You’re sitting there shaking like anything’,” he says.”And I’ll be sitting here eating tea; shaking. I don’t think I’m doing it, but I am.

“My nerves are shot.”

The two drivers involved in last weekend’s fatal accident are yet to return to work and Mr Parslow says the men would be suffering emotionally – with grief, sleeplessness and nightmares.

“It affects your life – it affects your family life; it affects your work life,” he says.

But he commends a Pacific National move to implement a trauma response unit, which would help drivers immediately after an accident.

Mr Parslow says he loves his job, but another serious accident would make him consider giving up his 32-year career.”If I have another big one again, that’s it. I’m finished,” he says.

He says despite Government advertising campaigns calling for the public to stay alert around railway lines, too many people – drivers, cyclists and pedestrians – flirt with danger.

“People are still in too much of a hurry and taking too many risks,” he says.

“Drivers are still going across crossings when it’s dangerous; even when the gates are down – they just go around.”

via AdelaideNow