{"id":24604,"date":"2024-12-01T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2024-12-01T07:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/minor-derailment-interrupts-friday-evening-polar-express-schedule-in-durango\/"},"modified":"2026-03-30T22:57:11","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T04:57:11","slug":"minor-derailment-interrupts-friday-evening-polar-express-schedule-in-durango","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/minor-derailment-interrupts-friday-evening-polar-express-schedule-in-durango\/","title":{"rendered":"Minor derailment interrupts Friday evening Polar Express schedule in Durango"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"The
The Durango & Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad had a small issue with a tender wheel on Friday evening, bringing the Polar Express train to a halt for the rest of the evening. (Jerry McBride\/Durango Herald)<\/span>Jerry McBride<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

A Durango & Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad Polar Express locomotive derailed as it was entering the train yard in Durango shortly after 6 p.m. Friday, causing evening rides to be canceled and requiring riders to disembark and walk back to the station.<\/p>\n

The train was traveling at 3 to 4 mph and entering the rail yard behind the train station at 479 Main Ave. at 6:10 p.m. when it was derailed, D&SNG said in a Saturday news release.<\/p>\n

A set of tender wheels attached to the locomotive and the tender truck failed to navigate a switch, which forced the truck onto the rails and onto the ground, according to D&SNG.<\/p>\n

The tender wheels were the only issue, and no other train cars had mechanical failures, the release said.<\/p>\n

D&SNG General Manager Jeff Johnson said train rides scheduled for Saturday were not affected by the minor derailment. Customers who were affected were offered a complementary ride Saturday evening, or applicable vouchers for this season or the 2025 season.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe biggest bummer for us is that we want the families and kids to get their trip,\u201d he said. \u201c \u2026 For those that can\u2019t ride with us (Saturday night), we\u2019re going to go ahead and send them all vouchers to return at any time through this year and next year.\u201d<\/p>\n

He said as of around 4:30 p.m. Saturday, 263 passengers who missed rides on the Polar Express on Friday because of the derailment had claimed complimentary rides for Saturday evening.<\/p>\n

Crews tended to the derailment until about 1 a.m. Saturday, he said. They placed the tender truck back onto the rail and transport it to the railroad\u2019s shop for repairs.<\/p>\n

The derailment broke one segment of rail. Around 5:30 a.m. Saturday, the railroad\u2019s track crew was able to repair it.<\/p>\n

\u201cEveryone really rallied,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

cburney@durangoherald.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

\"A
A Durango & Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad Polar Express locomotive derailed as it was entering the train yard in Durango shortly after 6 p.m. Friday, causing evening rides to be canceled and requiring riders to disembark and walk back to the station. (Jerry McBride\/Durango Herald)<\/span>Jerry McBride<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Patrons were offered refunds, applicable vouchers<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":24605,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[431,950,170,28],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-24604","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-business-general","tag-durango","tag-durango-and-silverton-narrow-gauge-railroad-co","tag-headlines"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24604","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=24604"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24604\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":78603,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24604\/revisions\/78603"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/24605"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=24604"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=24604"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=24604"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=24604"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}