Game Is Deadly for O.C. Teen on Train Trestle

In the early darkness of Easter Sunday, five teen-agers apparently looking for the ultimate rush lined up on a railroad trestle, turned their backs parallel to the tracks, and waited to be buffeted by the wind from a passing train.

But just as the train roared over the Dale Street trestle at 45 m.p.h., police said, one teen made a misstep that cost him his life in what is believed to be Orange County’s first such accident in recent years.

At the last instant, Ryan Adam Pennington, 18, of Buena Park, reportedly tried to change places with one of his friends. He stepped between the teen-ager next to him and the train, lost his footing and fell into the 1,000-foot-long freight train, police said.

“Apparently as the train started to go by them, he decided to move towards the other end of the line,” Sgt. Jim Dixon said. “He moved from his position against the railing closer to the train and was struck by it.”

Pennington died instantly in the 3:16 a.m. incident, Dixon said. None of the four other teens was injured. Police said that three girls in the group stepped away from the rails when they saw the train coming. Authorities wouldn’t release the names of any witnesses.

Santa Fe Railway spokeswoman Kathy Westphal said late Sunday that although the seven-car train heading from Barstow to Los Angeles wasn’t going particularly fast, “I don’t think people realize trains cannot stop.”

“A locomotive is over 200 tons,” Westphal said. “Why would someone step in front of something that’s as tall as a two-story building and going 45 m.p.h.?”

The train had just left Fullerton, where it picked up freight cars, and was en route to Los Angeles when it reached the trestle, according to police.

As the train crossed the small railroad bridge above a gully, the teen-agers were standing next to each other--leaning against a waist-high railing, separated from the railroad tracks by four feet of space, Dixon said.

Later on Easter, Pennington’s family struggled to come to terms with the senselessness of his death--one of dozens throughout the nation over the years involving teens playing games of chance with trains.

Pennington’s stepfather, David Yuhas, 35, said the area near the tracks was a popular hideaway for the teen and his friends.

“I knew they would sit down there and talk over teen-age problems and stuff,” Yuhas said. “But I was very surprised he was anywhere near a moving train.”

The tragedy occurred just as Pennington, who recently dropped out of Cypress College, was beginning to turn his life around.

“He was planning on moving to San Francisco next week,” Yuhas said. “He wanted to write. He was going to work with some people in journalism up there.”

Yuhas said Pennington originally wanted to leave last week, but was delayed when his traveling companion’s car broke down. Yuhas said he and Pennington’s mother, Virginia, last saw the teen a week ago when he stopped by to pick up belongings for the trip.

Pennington was the youngest of three children. He is survived by a brother Keith, 21, sister Vanessa, 20, and his mother.

Railroads have long experienced problems with teen-agers seeking thrills on railroad trestles, but Westphal said there have been fewer accidents since the 1970s, when safety classes began for the public.

“I don’t think (the number of deaths is) going up,” said Westphal, who couldn’t remember a similar mishap in Orange County.

“Our employees who see this every day tell kids just how dangerous it is,” Westphal said.

According to authorities, one of the most notorious trestles is in Carlsbad, in northern San Diego County, where teen-agers frequently play chicken with locomotives--standing on the tracks as the train roars toward them, then, at the last minute, jumping off the trestle and 35 feet down into the Agua Hedionda Lagoon.

In some places, youths have been known to line up on the rails and wait to see who will be the last one to jump from the train’s path. Sometimes, they even videotape the contest.