Minn. Rescuers Describe Gruesome Scene After Train Accident

Aug. 17--Two kids rode their bikes up to Joseph Kubiszewski and begged him to call 911 on his cellphone Thursday evening. He had no idea of the horrible sight he was about to see.

Kubiszewski, who was walking his dog in St. Paul's North End, didn't have a cellphone, but he hurried to where the kids pointed. He saw a young boy lying on his stomach in the grass by the railroad tracks near Farrington Street and Ivy Avenue. The boy was holding his legs in the air, but his feet were missing. They had been cut off by a train.

"It was a gruesome sight," Kubiszewski said. "He was trying to crawl. I just said, 'Lay still. Lay still.'"

The boy, Marshawn Kenneth Farr-Robinson, 9, of St. Paul, apparently was playing alongside the railroad tracks shortly before 6 p.m.

St. Paul Fire Marshal Steve Zaccard said the boy apparently was trying to climb on a slow-moving train when he slipped, fell and got run over.

Kubiszewski, 28, who lives in the neighborhood, said he was the first adult on the scene. "He was yelling, 'Help me, help me, call my mom,'" Kubiszewski said.

Although the boy was frightened, Kubiszewski said he was struck at how calm the child was.

"He was barely crying. I would've been bawling my eyes out," Kubiszewski said. "I was saying, 'Lay back, lay back, buddy.' I was trying to hold back tears because I didn't want to scare him."

Kubiszewski said the boy wasn't bleeding badly, but he seemed to be in shock. He apparently had crawled a long way.

He was about 10 yards from the tracks, but when he asked for his shoes, he pointed out to where they were about 30 yards down the tracks, Kubiszewski said.

"He said 'My shoes are on the tracks. My shoes are on the tracks,' " Kubiszewski said.

By this time, another man from the neighborhood came up on his bicycle and retrieved the shoes, Kubiszewski said. The boy's feet were still in them.

"I wanted to keep his head down. I didn't want him to see," Kubiszewski said.

The boy also asked for his pants. He had crawled out of them and they were by the track. When given the pants, the boy held them to his chest, Kubiszewski said.

Kubiszewski recognized the boy from the neighborhood.

"He's cut our grass once or twice," Kubiszewski said. "He was just the nicest kid."

One of the children on the bikes who originally called out to Kubiszewski returned with a cellphone and Kubiszewski called 911. A dispatcher instructed him how to perform first aid. Another neighbor came out with a cloth to wrap around the boy's ankles, Kubiszewski said.

The police arrived within five to seven minutes, Kubiszewski said, followed shortly by an ambulance. A first responder took the feet and put them on a bag of ice, he said.

" 'I don't think we can do much,' is what I heard him say," Kubiszewski said.

Hospital officials confirmed Friday afternoon the boy was being treated at Gillette Children's Hospital in St. Paul.

The tracks are owned by BNSF Railway. Police said the train involved in the accident was a Canadian Pacific Railway train. But BNSF Railway spokeswoman Amy McBeth said she could not say if the train was a BNSF or a Canadian Pacific train.

She said the incident is tragic in any case.

"It's extremely dangerous to be near railroad tracks" she said "It's private property, and very dangerous."

Some houses along Ivy Avenue are close to the track, and neighbors said people routinely walk across the tracks, taking a shortcut through paths in the woods along the railway.

"I see a lot of kids getting on the tracks," said Ivy Avenue resident Pao Xiong, who estimated that the tracks are about 50 feet from the rear of his house. "I tell them, 'You have to get off the tracks.' They say it's not my property."

Xiong said that trains run along the track seven or eight times a day. He said he forbids his eight kids to go near them.

"This is a pretty sad story. As a neighborhood, we take this pretty hard," said Amanda McCulloch, who said she lives next door to the boy's family about a block and a half from the tracks on Farrington Street. She said her children play with the boy. "He made a mistake that he can't undo and he's a 9-year-old boy that likes to run and play."

Zaccard said the paramedics and EMTs who went to the scene were given a critical-incident stress debriefing, which is offered to emergency workers who respond to particularly traumatic events.

"It's a terrible accident," Zaccard said. "It's a serious injury. When it happens to a child, it's even more difficult."

Joseph Lindberg contributed to this report. Richard Chin can be reached at 651-228-5560. Follow him at twitter.com/RRChin.I

Copyright 2013 - Pioneer Press, St. Paul, Minn.