Students at Meridian Community College learn about railroad crossing safety

According to the Federal Railroad Administration data in 2015 and 16, it shows there were fatalities reported in Mississippi involving railroad crossings and trespassing incidents some even in Lauderdale County.

Today at Meridian Community College the executive director from Operation Life Saver spoke to students about the dangers of railroad crossings in hopes of counting down on any future fatalities.

“This age group is a really good group to target especially because they’re so many crossings in proximity to this school, and these students are mostly commuters and as they come in and out of campus I just want them to be aware of the dangers and to always look both ways and to always expect a train”

Operation LifeSaver executive director Kimbler Sloan says most college-age students aren’t aware of railroad crossings danger and sometimes will cross the tracks even when the safety arms are let down.

“When they’re use to going over the tracks day in and day out it’s nice to have a refresher and to just remind them of the dangers, every year we try to at least set up a both in a school that’s within proximity as part of the events for this week to bring about more awareness to let the students know the dangers associated talk to them a little bit about it.”

Sloan also says age plays a factor when trying to spread any railroad safety awareness.

“18 to 35 is the primary demographics that we’re trying to target which is another reason why college students are a really good group going to a college for that reason it’s harder to get to them, I mean for the younger kids we can always go to school when it’s part of a school presentation we actually can sit down and talk to them but there’s not really an event for college students that we can do other than setting up in like a student life center.”

According to Sloan, she hopes that students learned a valuable lesson on railroad safety and will take caution the next time they approach a railroad crossing.

“While the numbers of deaths that are related to train incidents aren’t as high as motor vehicle incidents, one is too many, and we want to bring about awareness so that we have zero fatalities for highway-railway crossings as well as trespassing fatalities in Mississippi.”