Texas Puts On Dog for Stranded Amtrak Riders

The 328 passengers on a stranded Amtrak train were treated to West Texas hospitality and a barbecue Tuesday after a freight train derailment kept them in this tiny town for more than 10 hours.

The Sunset Limited, which runs from New Orleans to Los Angeles, was stopped at Sanderson about 10:30 a.m. Tuesday when a Southern Pacific freight train derailed ahead of it, said Debbie Marciniak, a spokeswoman for Amtrak in Chicago.

“We could have detoured but we found it would take a minimum of 13 to 14 hours,” Marciniak said.

So Amtrak contacted officials in the town of 1,200 people to arrange accommodations for the 328 passengers and 18 crew members--including an impromptu, massive buffet barbecue for dinner.

“We started working on it about 11:30 a.m.--just as soon as they called,” said John Sandifer, who operates Kountry Kitchen with his wife, Jeanie.

“Everybody was real pleased since Amtrak was paying for it. Everyone I talked to was in a real good mood,” he said. By 7 p.m., the last of the barbecue brisket, sausage, hamburgers, hotdogs, baked beans and potato salad had been eaten, he said.

“We just barely made it,” he said. “We did up about 125 pounds of potato salad. They’ve cleaned us out,” he said, referring to the passengers who reboarded the train after the 10-hour wait.

Meantime, the local historical society offered passengers brief tours of town, children were taken to a park to play and the movie “La Bamba” was available in the train’s theater.

Sanderson, about 120 miles west of Del Rio and about 180 miles south of San Angelo, has about 1,200 residents.