I don’t believe the family of this Girard teenager ever got the answers they were searching for about how this crash happened. The mother wore her son’s class ring on her finger as she took me and photographer Shannon Kirshner to the crash site in October 2007. I’ll never know how she managed to keep herself together.

Mourning ‘Munchy’ / Girard teen died when car he was driving was struck by train
Oct. 29, 2007

GIRARD – To his friends, Matt Munchalfen was “Munchy,” a shy, all-around good guy who had a secret crush on a popular schoolmate. To his neighbors, he was the dependable young man who showed up to cut their grass, rake their leaves and put up riprap at their lakeside homes.

His younger brother and sister could count on Matt for rides and advice. Matt’s father expected his son to take over the family electrical business. He already could fully wire a garage.

And Matt was his mother’s first-born child. Despite being a busy 19-year-old, he often stopped by her bedroom to chat whenever he returned home from a night out with his friends.

“I didn’t know how many people Matt touched, how many people he knew,” Joanne Munchalfen said last week. “This is something that hits close to home for all parents.”

Matt, a senior at Girard High School, died Oct. 13 when an Amtrak train struck his sport utility vehicle as he crossed a track on Greenridge Road two miles from his home.

There is no clear-cut answer for why the accident happened. Matt was killing time that morning. He was to meet his dad at the shop, and they were to work on a deck project. His father was running late, and it was raining. Joanne Munchalfen believes he was going to a popular four-wheeling spot to see if any of his friends were out riding.

He headed west on Greenridge Road, a crossing with only a yield sign that last week was partially obscured by overgrown tree limbs.

Several factors make the crossing unique. The railroad track runs parallel to Illinois 4. When heading west on Greenridge, drivers must stop just on the other side of the track for a stop sign at the highway.

To the north, the track is a double track. Once it makes a slight curve about a half a mile north of the crossing, it narrows to one track. A large steel maintenance or utility box for the railroad sits north of the crossing on the east side of the rails and partially obscures the vision of drivers heading west on Greenridge.

There are no flashing lights or crossing arms at the intersection.

Joanne Munchalfen said she was told there was a vehicle sitting on the other side of the tracks at the stop sign for the highway and that a second train was sitting where the double track becomes a single track.

She believes all those factors may have distracted her son and, combined with the lack of train warnings, contributed to him driving onto the track in front of the train.

Illinois State Police handled the crash investigation. A report does not note a vehicle sitting at the stop sign or workers on the track.

The southbound Amtrak, consisting of an engine and four passenger cars, was going about 78 mph. The conductor told police he blew the train’s horn upon approaching the crossing but the driver of the white Ford Explorer did not slow down prior to crossing the track.

The train dragged the SUV 2,100 feet before it could stop.

Matt’s cell phone was found at the accident site, and Joanne Munchalfen said she and her husband checked the call history but found no evidence that Matt was on the phone at the time of the crash.

“He was always my cautious child. He never took risks. He was just a good kid,” Joanne Munchalfen said. “They said he was looking south at the time. I’m hoping that’s the case, that he didn’t know what hit him.”

Joanne Munchalfen, who wears Matt’s class ring on her finger, is committed to getting out the word that drivers, especially teenagers, need to be more cautious around railroad crossings. She also hopes to get the attention of someone who can put up a more effective crossing signal at the Green Ridge intersection.

She also is concerned about Matt’s friends, who are going to the accident site to leave memorials for Matt.

“I just don’t want to see this happen to anybody else,” she said. “I was always worried about deer. I never in a million years thought about a rural railroad.”

Capt. Tim Reents, commander of the District 18 state police in Litchfield, said police try to educate young drivers about the dangers of railroad crossings.

“What I tell people about railroad crossings is even if they have warning lights or even if they have the cross arms that come down, don’t always trust those because they are mechanical devices. They can fail,” he said. “I would treat every train crossing as if there is a train coming. Slow down, turn the radio down, maybe roll the window down, look both ways, listen and just be very, very cautious.”

He said drivers also should be particularly careful at crossings where the railroad track parallels a highway, such as the crossing on Greenridge Road.

“A lot of times what will happen is that even though the track may parallel evenly with the road, those crossings will angle a little and you almost have to look back over your shoulder to see if anything is coming,” Reents said.

Reents said the state police review all collisions between vehicles and trains, and if they believe there is an issue, they alert the Illinois Department of Transportation.

“Our officers are pretty good when they go out and handle a crash, especially a fatal or a serious accident, if they start going to same place over and over again, they’re pretty good about bringing things to our attention,” he said.

“I think everyone would like to have something to put their finger on and say, ‘That’s why it happened,’ and a lot of times you can’t put your fingers on those things,” he said. “You can know the dynamics – how fast it was going, how far it traveled, the point of impact. You can do all those scientific things, but to know what was going on in people’s minds is difficult.”

Meanwhile, Joanne Munchalfen continues her search for answers and tells others to hug their kids often.

“It’s only been a week, and I think the thing my husband and I have noticed is how adult he really was. He would just take over things and do them,” she said, crying. “I think he was happy. He just had so many things going for him, and I guess that’s why it’s so unreal.”