By Greg Kocher, The Lexington Herald-Leader, Ky.
Sep. 7–HIGH BRIDGE — A Nicholasville man plunged to his death yesterday after accidentally falling from a railroad bridge that spans the Kentucky River.
Timmy Williams, 18, died after falling from a platform about 75 to 100 feet below the top of High Bridge, said Jessamine County Sheriff Kevin Corman. Williams landed on the ground below, falling perhaps an additional 150 to 200 feet.
The fall was witnessed by three people accompanying Williams, Corman said.
The group had climbed down from Ky. 29, which passes beneath the Norfolk Southern railroad bridge, to a ladder that leads to the trestle’s steel superstructure, Corman said.
From there they climbed onto an X-shaped brace that extends over a limestone cliff.
“He got out on the framework of that bridge and I don’t know if he was being careless or what, but the next thing you know he fell,” Corman said.
The accident was reported about 4:30 p.m., Corman said.
For years the bridge has been a hangout for teens, young adults and thrill-seekers who like the view near the confluence of the Kentucky and Dix rivers. Some have even parachuted from the span, as three people did in November 1998.
When it opened in 1877, High Bridge was the first cantilever bridge in North America, and it was the highest bridge over a navigable stream until the early 20th century.
In 1986, the American Society of Civil Engineers designated High Bridge as an engineering landmark.
Railroad police and the Jessamine sheriff’s department patrol the area, but the bridge’s lure remains strong, even though trains rumble across the twin-track span between Jessamine and Mercer counties.
In 2000, a 33-year-old Lexington man fell or jumped from the bridge as a southbound train approached.
In 1988, a Harrodsburg High School senior fell through the crossties on the bridge and died, falling on the rocks below. Nine years before that, a University of Kentucky student was killed when he tried to climb the trestle.
The railroad put up a 12-foot-high fence with barbed wire on top in the early 1980s, and it has put up “No Trespassing” signs.
But people walk around the fences and up a steep hill to the tracks and bridge. Trespassing citations have only a temporary effect in keeping thrill-seekers away.
“Every time we get a call about somebody being down here, we come down here and cite them or, at the very least, run ’em off,” Corman said.
Reach Greg Kocher in the Nicholasville bureau at (859) 885-5775.
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