The Sunset Limited Train Derailment
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Due to the graphic nature of this episode, listener discretion is advised. This episode includes discussions of terrorism and death. Consider this when deciding how and when you'll listen. It's October 9th, 1995, and a passenger train chugs through the Arizona desert. Neil Halford has spent the last two days on board, traveling from Texas to California. It's been a long trip.

One he could have shortened dramatically if he'd flown instead, but airplanes really freak him out. Despite Neil's best laid plans, he's about to have a front row seat to a terrifying event. One where he will discover arguably the biggest clue as to who is responsible. Welcome to Conspiracy Theories, a Spotify podcast. I'm Carter Roy.

You can find us here every Wednesday. Be sure to check us out on Instagram at The Conspiracy Pod. And we would love to hear from you. So if you're listening on the Spotify app, swipe up and give us your thoughts. Today, we're taking you moment by moment through the 1995 Sunset Limited train derailment.

It's an act of domestic terrorism that's never been solved, even though the person or group who did it left behind a signed anti-government manifesto. The train is sabotaged mere months after Timothy McVeigh is apprehended for the Oklahoma City bombing and less than one month after the Unabomber's manifesto is published.

And it follows a long history of domestic terrorist groups, like the Weather Underground, claiming responsibility for their acts. Perhaps the train derailment really was carried out by a hidden splinter cell that remained undetected by every investigative agency in the US. Or maybe

The real perpetrator had no affiliations and was simply taking advantage of the social climate to mask their own motives. Before we get started, amongst the many sources we used, we found unsolved mysteries as well as interviews conducted by Brianna Whitney extremely helpful to our research. Stay with us.

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- Hello there, I'm Mike Flanagan, and welcome to Spectre Vision Radio's production of "Director's Commentary." "Director's Commentary" is a deep dive into a film through the eyes of the filmmaker or filmmakers who made it. It combines an in-depth interview format with a classic "Director's Commentary" track, the likes of which used to be common on physical media releases, but sadly are becoming more and more rare these days. Filmmakers talking about film with filmmakers for people who love film.

In the 1990s, large stretches of the Arizona desert were desolate and undeveloped. Snakes slithered between cacti, distant peaks loomed over empty expanses. The sun baked the sand during the day while frigid temperatures swept in each night. There were no real roads or towns.

The only sign of humanity was a set of train tracks cutting through an otherwise empty plane, the Sunset Limited Line. Some people might have enjoyed this kind of isolation. Passengers aboard the trains could look out their windows at the endless expanse, the peaceful scenery. But this isolation also meant that if anything went wrong, help was hard to come by.

which was what happened to a crowded Amtrak passenger train in 1995. A horrible accident left its riders alone in the desert with no one to rely on but each other. On the night of October 9th, 1995, a 12-car train zips through the Arizona desert. There are 258 passengers on board. Luanne Zaloski sits in the second to last car.

She's on the final leg of her solo journey to Los Angeles. It's around 1:30 a.m. and like many passengers, Luanne's trying to get some shut-eye when suddenly the train shakes violently. The tremor is powerful enough to throw Luanne from her seat. She hits the ground hard, then hears wood splintering and a massive crash.

Luanne has lived through earthquakes, and that's what this feels like now. Like the ground is rumbling beneath the car. It's terrifying, disorienting, but the shaking stops as quickly as it began. Then for a moment, the desert is quiet. While her fellow passengers sit in stunned silence, Luanne gets up and ventures outside. She's met with a vast expanse of sand and cacti,

There is no sign of civilization, no distant town or country road, no street lights or signs, no sirens from incoming police or firefighters. The night is completely still until screams fill the air. Babies wail, people shout for help,

One woman calls for her children over and over. It's chaotic, intense, so much so that Luanne can vividly recall the experience years later during an interview with Arizona Family News. She describes people wandering around in total disbelief, not knowing what just happened or what to do next. Looking for some answers, Luanne walks along the tracks and examines the train herself.

She can see it's in bad shape right away. It stopped over a bridge that crosses a 30-foot deep chasm. The front cars are safely across one side and the back cars are on the other. But four cars in the middle of the train, the ones that should be on the bridge, have tipped off the tracks. One crossed over before slipping off the rails, lying on its side on solid ground.

Two others have fallen all the way into the ravine itself. The fourth hangs from the bridge halfway into the chasm. The train has been derailed. Train derailments are more common than you might think. According to reporting from Vox in 2014, there were over 1,200 derailments in the United States alone. Well, that's an average more than three a day.

The majority of these accidents aren't dangerous because trains are designed to withstand them. Most carry cargo, not passengers, so it's extremely rare for anyone to be hurt. The problem is this Sunset Limited train is full of people, and it's time to assess how much damage has really been done.

Amtrak employees walk through the cars at the back of the train, the one still on the track, to check on passengers. They don't offer any answers about what happened. Instead, they just encourage unharmed travelers to stay put. It's safer on board than out in the desert. But few people heed the advice. There are still cries of pain and fear, and everyone is just trying to figure out what's going on.

like a 29-year-old kitchen worker named Darrell Taylor. In a stroke of bad luck, Darrell happened to be in one of the cars that went into the ravine, a dorm-style sleeper car for the crew. When the train derailed, Darrell flew out of his bed and slammed into the window of his compartment. By the time people are assessing the situation above, Darrell is stuck in the ravine inside his train car with a concussion.

The power's out. He's been sleeping naked, and now he's fumbling around in the dark, trying to put on his clothes. That's when he hears someone in the next room calling for help. Daryl feels around for a door, but the only way to escape is through the windows. Since the car is on its side, they're now above him. Daryl wiggles up through the opening and calls to the person in the other room, telling them to do the same.

He emerges into a world of chaos. He sees the other derailed cars. He hears people screaming in fear and pain. It's dark, cold, and his head is throbbing. The whole situation is unreal, like something from a disaster movie. But unfortunately for everyone involved, this is real life. And those screams mean there are people who need help.

Darrell quickly jumps into action and follows the cries. He and a few others move between the derailed cars, assessing the damage and pulling people to safety. By his estimate, they help at least 75 injured passengers, which is a huge percentage given there were just over 250 people on board. In some cases, rescuers have to yank fellow travelers hard to lift them through the windows.

There's a worry about dislocating someone's shoulder, but the risk seems worth it. Better to be safe with an injured arm than trapped inside the train. Daryl drops down into the dark chambers of the wrecked cars nine different times. For those that are severely injured, he fashions a makeshift gurney out of a sheet, then he works with other rescuers to haul them out.

One elderly man seemingly lost his sight in the crash and needs someone to lift him through the opening he can't see. A woman has a deep cut on her face that won't stop bleeding. One of her rescuers makes a bandage out of a torn sheet. From either side of the ravine, people slide down the steep slopes, risking their own safety for the sake of those who are trapped.

At least one nurse happened to be on board, and she does what she can, but it's tough when there are dozens of people injured. At some point during his rescue efforts, Darrell notices that someone is missing. The sleeping car attendant, 58-year-old Mitchell Bates. No one has heard from him since the crash. It's possible he's off somewhere helping others, but Darrell fears the worst. What if Mitchell is hurt?

What if he's trapped somewhere and no one's found him yet? Daryl and a few others take off in search of Mitchell. They head straight to one of the cars in the ravine, the sleeper car. That's where Mitchell would have been at the time of the crash. It's nearly impossible to access. The rescue group has to break a window and then wade through the shattered glass to reach Mitchell's compartment. When they finally get there, they're all uneasy.

There's no sound coming from the room. They push the door open, dreading what they'll find inside. When Daryl Taylor and some volunteers enter the derailed sleeper car, they find Mitchell Bates pinned behind a pile of mattresses. His face is smashed. His limbs are twisted and crushed. There's no question about it. Mitchell is dead. Daryl bursts into tears.

The enormity of the situation sinks in. This crash wasn't just terrifying, it was deadly. Daryl can only hope they won't find more mangled bodies in the train and that first responders will show up soon. Because at this point, it's been 45 minutes and paramedics still haven't arrived, which isn't entirely their fault, seeing as the train has crashed in the middle of the desert.

There are a lot of challenges in trying to get there. First, when Amtrak employees call for help, it's hard to even describe where they are. There aren't any landmarks or cities nearby, so they don't know what to tell the medics, firefighters, and police officers. And since it's such a rural area, there aren't that many first responders available to begin with.

The only 911 dispatcher working that night is a woman named Patricia Borey. She's in a small town outside of Phoenix called Buckeye. Her community is so tiny, it only has one streetlight and no professional fire departments. It's volunteer run. But Buckeye seemed to be the closest town to where the Sunset Limited went off the rails.

So, the County Sheriff's deputy calls Patricia and says she needs to send rescuers somewhere along the rail lines. They aren't sure of the exact location. Patricia sends teams up and down the tracks. It's not clear if these are ground-based teams or helicopters or what, but eventually someone is able to locate the disaster site. That's just the first step.

Now, they have to get enough emergency personnel to the area to help all the people stranded there, which is a lot harder than it sounds. The wreckage lies over 50 miles from downtown Phoenix, and there are barely any roads that lead here. Of course, helicopters are an option. They can fly in and transport the most severely injured passengers to hospitals in and around Phoenix.

But there aren't enough to rescue everyone, so authorities need to figure out how to navigate the desert on wheels. In other words, they need to make their own road. Patricia gets creative. She reaches out to local farmers and people who own grading equipment. Think machines that scrape the ground, bulldozers, the kind that roll asphalt, any other kind of construction machinery that can level the ground quickly.

While authorities fight their way towards the wreckage, the victims of the disaster continue their chaotic rescue efforts. Luanne Zalowski is still checking out the train when she hears an engineer ask if anyone has a camera. As it happens, Luanne does have her 35mm film camera with her. The engineer tells her to come with him.

Amtrak employees have located the exact spot where the train went off the tracks, and they need it on record. So Luanne and the engineer walk up to this patch of warped metal, and Luanne snaps a few shots. She isn't an expert on train engineering, but still, she can tell by looking these rails didn't come apart on their own. This was no accident.

someone sent them hurtling off the tracks on purpose. It's only a matter of time before other passengers find more clues that suggest sabotage. Ever since the Sunset Limited train lurched to a violent stop, Neil Halford has been waiting for answers. All he knows is the engine has separated from the cars behind it and some of the segments have derailed.

His cabin seems fairly safe. When the crash happened, he flew out of his seat and a tray table knocked the wind out of him. So he's a bit bruised, but it certainly could have been worse. His train car is still on the tracks, still upright, and Amtrak employees have instructed him and the other passengers not to leave. For a while, Neil is content to follow their instructions.

But as the minutes tick by, he gets antsy and the car gets really uncomfortable. He later describes the extent of it to local news outlet, the Arizona Republic. The toilets have stopped flushing. The power is still out. There's no air circulation, which means it's getting hot inside and probably a little smelly. So Neil slips out for some fresh air.

In spite of the warnings about spiders and snakes, he starts walking. There's a full moon illuminating the desert landscape. It's bright enough for Neil to spot something odd on the ground about 12 feet from the tracks. A piece of paper weighted down by a rock. Neil picks it up. It looks like a letter or, more accurately, a manifesto.

typed up and carefully placed here at the scene of the disaster. The message is some kind of anti-government rant, presumably from the attacker, although the writer doesn't explicitly take credit for the derailment. They also don't really say who they are. The page is just signed by some group called the Sons of Gestapo. Soon, Neil finds a second note,

A later search turns up two more. Generally, they all say the same thing, but they're not identical. Each version has variations. One says, quote, "...who is policing the ATF, FBI, state troopers, county sheriffs, and local police? It is time for an independent federal agency to police the law enforcement agencies and other government employees."

This same letter also includes references to recent clashes between federal authorities and far-right militants at Ruby Ridge and Waco. You've probably heard about these cases, but just in case, here's a refresher on the details.

Three years before the derailment in 1992, officials stormed a cabin in Ruby Ridge, Idaho. It was the home of militant Randy Weaver, who had been accused of illegal arms dealing and then didn't show up for his trial. What could have been a routine arrest became a full-blown standoff when Randy refused to surrender and U.S. Marshals killed the family dog.

Gunfire was exchanged, killing a marshal and Randy's 14-year-old son. The violence only ended after federal snipers killed Randy's wife, who'd been trying to protect their youngest child. Six months later after that, law enforcement raided a compound in Waco, Texas. When the residents, a group called the Branch Davidians, returned gunfire, a 51-day siege ensued.

Finally, on April 19th, FBI agents tried to end the standoff by bombarding the complex with flammable tear gas. A fire broke out inside the compound and in the end, 75 residents were killed, including 25 children. In the years after these incidents, Ruby Ridge and Waco became rallying cries for anti-government activists, particularly those in the right wing.

Many pointed to the repeated use of deadly force as proof that federal agencies couldn't be trusted or even that they posed a threat to US citizens. Those talking points are still fresh in 1995. And based on this letter, it seems like they might have inspired the derailment. The Sons of Gestapo could be an anti-government terrorist organization, purposely sowing fear and division.

But if that was the group's plan, it isn't working. The survivors are banding closer together, determined to survive this disaster. And eventually, help arrives. With the roads cleared, first responders finally reach the site of the crash. Firefighters lower ladders into the ravine so the rest of the survivors can climb up to safer ground. There's one fatality, Mitchell Bates.

Nearly 100 are injured, 12 severely enough to need medical treatment. Reports from the incident mention serious cuts and multiple instances of head trauma that left survivors dazed. Some people are transported to hospitals in and around Phoenix. Others have their mild injuries checked out in a makeshift medical triage about six miles away. At some point, an Amtrak employee gives Luan Zalowski a task.

They've located a 12 or 13 year old boy named Patrick who's traveling alone. He doesn't have any friends or family with him. Luanne agrees to keep an eye on Patrick. She knows his parents must have heard about the accident, or they will soon, and they'll probably be worried sick about their son.

Only, Patrick doesn't have a cell phone. Most people don't, back in 1995. If Luanne wants to communicate with his family, she's going to have to get creative. She walks Patrick down to a crowd of newspaper reporters who've assembled not too far away, covering the scene. Luanne encourages the journalists to film Patrick and put the shots in their broadcast.

It's the only way she can think of to let his family know their son is alive. Just as Patrick's face is hopefully reaching news channels across the country, the rest of the survivors are loaded onto a bus bound for Phoenix's Union Station. There, they wait for their friends and family members to be released from ERs or catch different trains to their final destination. Investigators ask Neil Halford to stay behind.

They want to question him about the letters he found. Neil waits by the wreckage while the last of the train passengers and crew load onto buses and ride away. He's not alone. There are dozens of law enforcement agents scouring the scene, but he does feel isolated. He hasn't known the other survivors for long, but in the wake of the disaster, they forged instant friendships and connections.

Now those companions are gone. While some investigators talk to Neil, another 90 FBI agents scour the scene on their hands and knees, crawling across more than a square mile of desert in pursuit of any clue. And they find one in the tracks themselves. When investigators examine the spot where the train derailed,

they determine one very important piece of information. Whoever sabotaged the train knew exactly what they were doing. In order to cause such a huge disaster, the perpetrator or perpetrators had to remove 29 spikes that were holding together two pieces of the track. Then they inserted a metal plate to keep the rails from snapping back together.

That's why the bars ripped apart as soon as the train roared over them. Ordinarily, this kind of sabotage would be impossible. Most train tracks are welded together, not bolted. For those rare ones that are joined by spikes, safety mechanisms exist. If any part of the railway gets decoupled, a sensor should trigger an emergency light that warns the conductor to stop before reaching the broken spot.

But whoever separated the tracks also ran an electric wire between them to ensure the sensors didn't detect a break. They must have known enough about this railway line to realize a warning light would come on. And they must have known enough about electrical engineering to trick the system. Another clue that the saboteurs knew what they were doing: the tampered track was in a vulnerable spot.

The train didn't just lurch off the tracks. It did so while on a bridge, passing over a 30-foot drop. The cars fell much further than they would have if they'd been at ground level. And there's a curve in the rail at the crash site. This made the train more likely to tilt off the tracks as it rounded the bend.

Add in the fact that the spot was far from cities and rescuers took a long time to reach the injured. It's amazing more people weren't seriously hurt or killed. What's even more amazing is that just 18 hours before, another train safely passed over that exact same section of track. So whoever was responsible was there tampering with the tracks and planting those letters less than a day prior.

And the only clue authorities have about who these attackers are is that they call themselves the Sons of Gestapo. Ordinarily, a name like this would seem like a pretty good lead, except the FBI has never heard of them. At some point, the Center for Democratic Renewal in Atlanta weighs in. The Arizona Daily Star describes the center as "a national clearinghouse for information on hate groups."

So if anyone knows about the Sons of Gestapo, it's likely to be them. But they've never heard of the group either. Neither has the Anti-Defamation League or the Southern Poverty Law Center Hate Group Tracking Division. Investigators reach out to everyone they can think of for more information. And across the board, the answer is basically a shrug.

There isn't a shred of evidence that this group ever existed before the night of October 9th, 1995. If they are real, it seems like they were formed just to commit this attack. But it's hard to say why they'd do that.

Many militant groups, especially those that rallied after Waco and Ruby Ridge, advocate for a less powerful central government. They point to those standoffs as evidence that federal authorities are already too overreaching. And yet, the sons of the Gestapo cited those incidents while asking for more investigative activity from the top. They basically said they want the federal government

to make sure the federal government stays in line, which doesn't make a whole lot of sense. Which makes some people think that Ruby Ridge and Waco are red herrings. Whoever sabotaged the train might have included the political rhetoric to throw investigators off their trail. Maybe they're not part of an activist organization at all. The perpetrator could be a lone wolf.

who invented the Sons of Gestapo to make it seem like they have allies. A few officials speculate the culprit isn't a terrorist group at all, but rather a disgruntled rail employee who wants revenge on their bosses. See, for months there have been rumors that layoffs might hit Amtrak. The Sunset Limited route isn't as popular or profitable as it used to be. Some whisper the line might be abandoned.

with those who work on it potentially losing their jobs. Perhaps someone felt uneasy enough to lash out with deadly violence. But others say these rumors are overblown, and even if this disgruntled worker theory is true, it doesn't narrow anything down. Amtrak is a huge company with a lot of employees, and the FBI doesn't have any specific individual to focus on.

For a while, agents investigate other train derailments, hoping to find a connection. As it turns out, there was a similar unsolved crash over 50 years prior. An article was published about it in a small train enthusiast magazine just before the Sunset Limited derailment. The FBI now wonders if that article gave someone the idea for the attack.

So they get a list of the magazine's subscribers from the editor. Then they seem to turn their suspicion on the editor himself and ask him to provide an alibi for the night of the derailment. He does, and in any case, an article isn't evidence. It just goes to show how desperate investigators are and how few real leads they have to work with.

But the Bureau won't be discouraged. In a statement to the Arizona Republic, Special Agent Michael Lum says, quote, "We are not going to quit. We're never going to go away. We're going to keep investigating this until it's solved." They eventually offer a reward of up to $250,000 for any tips that lead to a conviction. Amtrak and the Maricopa County Attorney's Office tack on their own incentives

bringing the reward up to $310,000. And yet, nobody comes forward to claim it. Flash forward to today. The money still hasn't been dispersed. Investigators still haven't identified a lead. There haven't been any new breaks in over 25 years.

As of the most recent reports, none of the hate crime watch groups ever find evidence that the Sons of Gestapo exist. If the FBI uncovers anything promising, they don't reveal these leads publicly. They do have the manifesto analyzed by a forensic linguist. About 10 years after the derailment, he tells a PBS docuseries about his experience working on the Sons of Gestapo letter.

Overall, he says, he can tentatively say the writer is an educated white male. And based on the writer's syntax, like the repeated use of the word kerosene, he believes they originally hail from the Northeast or Southeast region of the United States. Ultimately, his analysis doesn't get the FBI any closer to answers.

And Mitchell Bates, the man killed in the crash, never receives justice for his death. We may never know who sabotaged the Sunset Limited tracks or why, but we know their efforts didn't just derail a train. They disrupted hundreds of lives and ended one. Still, even in the midst of the chaos, connection and community prevailed.

Thank you for listening to Conspiracy Theories, a Spotify podcast. We're here with a new episode every Wednesday. Be sure to check us out on Instagram at TheConspiracyPod. And we would love to hear from you. So if you're listening on the Spotify app, swipe up and give us your thoughts.

Do you have a personal relationship to the stories we tell? Email us at conspiracystories at spotify.com. Amongst the many sources we used, we found unsolved mysteries, as well as interviews conducted by Brianna Whitney extremely helpful to our research. Until next time, remember, the truth isn't always the best story, and the official story isn't always the truth.

Conspiracy Theories is a Spotify podcast. This episode was written by Angela Jorgensen, edited by Karis Allen and Kate Murdock, researched and edited by Mickey Taylor, fact-checked by Claire Cronin, and sound designed by Russell Nash and Alex Button. Our head of programming is Julian Boisreau. Our head of production is Nick Johnson, and Spencer Howard is our post-production supervisor. I'm your host, Carter Roy.

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