Drunk man passes out on railroad tracks, gets run over by train, survives

[Wonk]

PEORIA, Ill. -- Matthew Lewis was taken to OSF-Saint Francis Medical Center Friday night with cuts, scrapes, a broken leg and a concussion. Lewis told police he passed out on the railroad tracks after a night of drinking, but couldn't remember being run over by the train.

The train was powered by three locomotives and carrying 114 cars loaded with coal.

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[greatauntoftriplets]

1. They say the Lord takes care of stupid people and drunks.

Maybe that's why numbnuts Bush gets away with so much, too. Something to think about.

[Positron]

2. Yeah. Shrub would be covered on both counts

He gets double protection.

[no_hypocrisy]

3. I'm waiting for the punchline: drunk (now sober) sues railroad.

*Sigh* Only in America . . . .

[pansypoo53219]

4. can somebody please explain

why a lot of drucks pass out on TRAIN TRACKS?!? I mean a park bench, yeah. bushes, yeah. train tracks? wtf.

[RMJ]

5. They trip over them.

Then, once they get down there it's too much effort to get back up. So they just go to sleep.

[leftofthedial]

6. Boy, if he was that drunk

I bet he wakes up feeling like he got hit by a train

[VOX]

7. The guy was solidly toasted with a 0.265 blood-alcohol content...

If he hadn't made it, he probably wouldn't have felt much...

http://abclocal.go.com/wls/news/090303_ap_ns_train.html

Mark Davis, a Union Pacific spokesman, said a person could survive in the small space between the belly of a train and the ground between the tracks.

"It's possible, but a person would have to lie very still. This person is very lucky," Davis said.

Police said Lewis' blood-alcohol content registered 0.265 percent when he was hospitalized after the accident. The legal limit for intoxication in Illinois is 0.08 percent...