Rail Officials Honor Man for Heroic Deed

On Jan. 28, Robert Barker, 72, was about to board the 7:52 a.m. train at the Burbank Metrolink Station bound for Union Station when he realized something was wrong with a fellow passenger.

The man who had been leaning against a pole near the tracks minutes earlier had begun to stagger around, as if dizzy.

Barker said the scene at first seemed like a nightmare, but it became very real when the man fell onto the tracks in front of the oncoming train.

Instinctively, the Sun Valley resident ran to the man’s side, grabbed his arm and, aided by a female passenger, pulled the man to safety.

The train, which had been about 150 feet away from the man when Barker rushed to help, passed them seconds after the two got him out of harm’s way.

Metrolink officials said the man, who had suffered a seizure stemming from a reaction to a medication, did not want to be identified, and the woman passenger disappeared into the crowd after the incident.

But at a meeting Friday of the Southern California Regional Rail Authority, Metrolink and Operation Lifesaver Inc., a national rail safety organization, honored Barker for his heroic deed, the first rescue in the six years Metrolink has been in operation.

At the meeting, Barker met the train conductor, who applied the brakes when he saw the man fall, but was unable to stop the 450-ton train in time.

Barker, a structural engineer, said he had never encountered anything unusual in the five years he’s traveled by train to the downtown offices of John A. Martin and Associates.

“You live a routine life and you don’t expect anything like this to happen,” he said. “And when suddenly it does, you just react.”

Barker said he only thinks about the possible dangers of his action now, in hindsight. If the man had been hit, would Barker have been pulled into the train along with him?

Barker said either way, he’d do it again.

“A human life is worth doing something about,” he said.