Marlow residents react to derailment disaster

LAWTON, Okla. (KSWO) - Sunday’s train derailment in Marlow has left the neighborhood a mess.

The incident itself catching everyone by surprise.

”I came into the living room and my daughter was commenting about how the train had really kicked up the dust,” said Margie Stallons, a Marlow resident. “So I looked out the door and it was, it was like a cloud of dust. But when I got closer, I was like ‘that kind of looks like smoke. "

”I heard what sounded like to me like fighter planes, or whatever, jets on top of the house,” Rosie Poeling said.

What the neighborhood heard was 12 derailed train cars. Though no one was injured and there were no hazardous chemicals on board, the wreckage left the community with a lot of work ahead of them.

Poeling said she’s kept track of other similar derailments across the nation, but never thought one would happen just outside her front door.

”I got on the TikTok side of all the derailments that’s been going on lately with the chemical spills and I thought, ‘Well wow, I live really close to the railroad tracks’ and wondered if this would happen,” she said. “It’s definitely a concern of if it would happen again.”

According to Union Pacific, crews on scene Monday removed all derailed cars from the track, reopening it to train traffic by later in the evening.

As far as the neighborhoods residents, the aftermath is something they said they deal with for a few more days.

”We were told that it will be at least six more days to remove all the cars and kind of get it cleaned up and going again, so hopefully by a week everything back down to normal,” Stallons said.

Despite that, they said they’re just happy that everyone is okay.

“I’m just really glad that it wasn’t worse than what it could’ve been, and everybody was safe and no houses appeared to be destroyed so that was good,” Poeling said.

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