The Great Northern Railroad Avalanche | Snowed In

Mike Corey (0:00)

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A listener note. Against The Odds uses dramatizations that are based on true events. Some elements, including dialogue, may be invented. But everything is based on research.

Ida Starrett smooths the hair of her 8-month-old son, Francis. He's teething and has been fidgety all night.

SPEAKER_3 (0:36)

It's okay.

Mike Corey (0:37)

It's okay.

SPEAKER_3 (0:38)

Mommy's here.

Mike Corey (0:39)

Mommy's here.

But Starrett is almost as restless as her son is. It's just past 2 a.m. on March 1st, 1910 And Starrett and her 3 children are aboard a great Northern Railroad train. What was supposed to be a routine overnight trip from Spokane, Washington to Seattle has turned into a never-ending ordeal. While Francis squirms in her arms, Starrett casts an anxious glance across the aisle at her other 2 children, 9-year-old Lillian and 7-year-old Raymond. Thankfully, they're both still sound asleep in their bunks.

Finally, Francis starts the drift off and Starrett lies back on her bed. Well, she thinks at least she's not in Spokane anymore. That's where she and her husband had been raising their 3 children. But last month, her husband was killed in an accident at the rail yard where he worked. The railroad company gave her just $500 in compensation. With little money and no prospects, she decided to move in with her parents in British Columbia. So, she bought train tickets for her and her 3 children, thinking it would be an easy trip. They left Spokane a week ago aboard the Seattle Express during a snowstorm. They'd hoped they'd make it over the Cascade Mountains before the weather got too bad. But soon, the snowfall was too heavy for the train to make it any further. Hundreds of railroad workers who are stationed up here in this mountain pass have been trying to clear the track, but they can't keep ahead of the falling snow. Now, the train is stuck in this small railroad depot in the Cascades.

Starrett and the 54 other passengers are going stir crazy. Food supplies are running low. Even worse, as the snow piles up, it's triggering avalanches on the mountain sides around them. Starrett has been hearing the rumbles of sliding snow for days. She doesn't know how much longer her nerves can take it. The snow can't last forever, she tells herself. She just has to be patient. But as soon as Starrett settles into sleep, lightning flashes outside, followed by a gigantic boom of thunder. Starrett jumps in her bunk, her heart pounding. Francis wails and Starrett's other children startle awake.

Raymond, Lillian, you can go back to sleep, okay? It's just some thunder.

But as Starrett soothes Francis, she notices something. The rumbling from the thunder hasn't died down yet. Not completely. It's still sounding in the distance. And in fact, it seems to be getting louder. This isn't like any thunder she's ever heard before.

Then, with a chill, she realizes the truth. That's not thunder. It's rumbling snow.

An avalanche. She goes rigid. Every other noise. Francis' sobs, the howling wind, the rattle of the train car windows, disappears from her mind.

Starrett's been hearing these rumbles for days, but this one sounds different. Much nearer. She clutches Francis and throws back the curtain of the window. And there it is. Exactly what she's been dreading. A towering wall of snow churning toward their train. Starrett hugs Francis close, braces for impact, and she brace.

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Mike Corey (5:36)