This morning I jumped out of bed at 6:01 to the sound of train wheels sliding against steel. It went on quite awhile—until the train finally stopped. Curiosity being a part of my nature, I was compelled to drive down to the rail-road to see what had been hit. There was the mile-long train, sitting on the track, and fortunately no accident—just a quick stop. Many things went through my mind as I was anticipated what could have been. Trains hit cars for one of three reasons: The warning signals failed to work (very rare), the driver thought he could beat the train (less rare), or the driver was impaired by alcohol (not rare at all).