Families cope with aftermath of train tragedy

KATE KELLY

Frontiersman reporter

In the blink of an eye a tragedy happens and remains imprinted on our souls for what seems an eternity.

Such is the recurring reality of Willow mother Melody Walker, whose 12-year-old son barely escaped being killed by the southbound tourist train that claimed the life of her son's close friend, Austin Webb-Heise, in Willow on July 15 after the two boys had fallen asleep near the railroad tracks following an all-night fishing excursion.

In 1991, she lost her 2-month-old son to Sudden Infant Death Syndrome.

"This brought back all those memories," Walker, 31, said Friday. "I've been mourning so much for Austin's mother, my husband thinks I'm in a worse state than my kid is. I wanted to give her a hug and comfort her, and I couldn't think of anything to say. It was so painful. My heart just goes out to her."

Walker said she will always remember the sweet smile Austin carried on his face, especially the morning of the accident when he and Michael showed her the fish they had caught and bragged about how they had stayed up all night.

"He was the kind of kiddo that would help anybody out," she said of the 13-year-old through her tears. "He had a lot of friends and touched a lot of hearts. At least he was doing something he loved - fishing."

In the week since the accident near the railroad bridge over Willow Creek at Mile 187, Walker has gone from barely being able to stand from the shock and grief, to anger over the funeral home demanding payment before services, to questioning whether she'll be able to continue working in emergency services for the Mat-Su Borough.

"When you're in this line of work, you run across some really horrid things that just stick in your mind," she said. "I love being able to go out there and help people, but this traumatized me to the point that I'm second-guessing it."

She also said she feels badly for the conductor of the train, who she heard from a state trooper on the scene was a 27-year veteran so traumatized by the incident that he's considering quitting the railroad. "I'm just trying to concentrate on how I'm going to get a hold of the engineer and thank him for his efforts," Walker said. "They saved my son's life."

But Michael doesn't quite see it that way. Walker said her son is angry at the train, blaming it for the death of his friend.

"He's upset at the train, so we're going to make a target out of a toy train and let him shoot it with paintballs," Walker said with an exhausted laugh, adding that Michael has been talking to counselors and friends since the incident and is still trying to piece it together. "The first two days were really hard on him."

Trooper spokesman Greg Wilkinson said that although people have speculated that maybe the boys were playing "chicken" with the train or were knocked out from drugs or alcohol, their investigations have not led them to believe that any of that is true.

"As far as we know, they just fell asleep," Wilkinson said Thursday, adding that the autopsy report on Webb will not be released until they have completed their investigation. The state medical examiner declared the incident an accident in a report released Monday.

Walker said she's keeping busy trying to help raise funds for funeral expenses for Austin. She and Austin's friends have been making donation containers out of coffee cans, and she is hoping to organize a car wash.

Walker's son, whose minor injuries were treated at the scene, told investigators that he and Austin had laid down on some warm rocks near the tracks because they were chilled and worn out from fishing all night and day.

Both boys, who had been classmates at Willow Elementary for several years before Michael went to the Lower 48 with his parents this past year, had apparently fallen asleep in the sun before the train powered by two 4300-horsepower engines rounded the corner near the bridge.

"The trainsmen blew the horn and put the train into an emergency stop when they realized the boys were there, but there was just no time," Alaska Railroad spokesman Tim Thompson said Friday. "A passenger train going 49 miles per hour takes several hundred feet to stop. It does not stop on a dime."

Walker said she and her husband, Jack, were ready to ground Michael for staying out all night — until they learned of the tragic event. Now she just wants him to understand the importance of a new rule: He is to always let them know where he is.

"It's a hard lesson for these kids, but it's even harder when you tell them to stay off the tracks and they defy you and then something terrible happens," Walker said. "It's the worst thing in the world."

Thompson said the Willow fatality marked the fifth time in the last decade that someone has been killed on Alaska's railroad tracks. The last incident involved a 50-year-old man near Talkeetna in 1999, Thompson said.

"That's why we try to educate people to stay at least 100 feet away from the tracks on either side," he said. "It's a very terrible and tragic event."

Kate Kelly can be reached at

352-2284.