Driver Killed in Amtrak Crash Mourned by Family, Neighbors

When he was not trucking loads of candy and other chocolate products in the San Joaquin Valley, David Thomas Haskell spent much of his free time at family get-togethers and fussing over the appearance of his tract-style home.

He played “Santa Claus” to his nieces and nephews, but to neighbors, the 47-year-old Haskell was best known as an avid gardener and landscaping enthusiast. He kept his lawn and shrubbery so meticulously groomed that others on East Alden Avenue shook their heads in admiration. To top it off, Haskell and roommate Scott Brent had just completed a front terrace.

It was on this terrace that neighbors had seen Haskell, reclining in a lawn chair and enjoying a cup of coffee on the last weekend of his life. For during his journey back north on his candy route Tuesday, he crashed his rig loaded with chocolate syrup into a speeding Amtrak train at a fog-locked San Joaquin Valley railroad crossing.

Haskell died instantly in the fiery crash near Stockton, as did the two crewmen aboard the train. At least 55 passengers were injured, 24 of them seriously. The five-car train, traveling 70 m.p.h, was headed south for Bakersfield at the time of the accident.

An autopsy on Haskell’s body was performed Tuesday, but Capt. Baxter Dunn of the San Joaquin County coroner’s office said the results will not be completed for two weeks pending toxicological tests. Dunn said the family had indicated it would claim the body by today. Family members were making funeral arrangements late Wednesday.

Christa Haskell, a 22-year-old niece of Haskell’s who lives in Newport Beach, said the entire family was in mourning Wednesday at the Pomona home of Haskell’s mother, Florence Haskell. His father, George, is deceased, she said.

Christa Haskell, whose father, Allen, a Newport Beach firefighter, is one of Haskell’s two brothers, remembered her “Uncle Dave” loved to be with children.

“He was always Santa Claus at Christmastime when we were growing up,” she said. “He was just a very fun man. He was always very involved with us when we were young.”

Twice divorced, Haskell had stepchildren but no children of his own, Christa Haskell added.

News of Haskell’s death shook the Anaheim neighborhood of modestly appointed homes where he had lived for the past five years, after his second marriage ended and he moved from Garden Grove.

Ed Salamack, 59, a friend and neighbor, said he ran to check on Haskell after hearing initial news reports that a David Haskell from Pomona had been killed in the collision.

“I was gonna go over and say, ‘Gee, Dave, it’s great to see ya,’ but his roommate came out and said he was dead,” said Salamack, a retired state employee. “He was the perfect neighbor. No wild parties. No excessive drinking. He was just a damn nice person.”

Haskell’s roommate, red-eyed and visibly shaken, declined to comment upon answering the door Wednesday.

Christa Haskell said her uncle had been a truck driver most of his adult life. According to Salamack, Haskell drove for Tab Transportation Inc., a warehousing and transportation company based in Fontana, for the past six years.

Harry Pullen, director of operations for Tab, declined comment about Haskell other than to say, “He was a good worker.”

State Department of Motor Vehicles records show that Haskell had been cited for speeding three times in the past two years--all along the San Joaquin Valley route where, Salamack said, he hauled loads of candy and other chocolate products almost every week.

“He worked all hours,” Salamack said. “Sometimes he’d leave at 11 o’clock on a Sunday night. Others, he’d leave at 3 in the afternoon. But he liked it. He was good at it.”

Haskell was trucking a load of chocolate syrup from the Hershey Chocolate, USA plant in Oakdale to a warehouse in Stockton, said Natalie Bailey, a Hershey corporate spokeswoman in Hershey, Pa.

While calling the accident “unfortunate,” Bailey said she had no information on Haskell. The company he worked for was one of several trucking firms contracted by Hershey to haul chocolate products, she said. The Oakdale plant is one of nine maintained nationwide by Hershey.

ON TRACK: Officials still seeking cause of Tuesday’s fatal collision. A3