Quote, originally posted by Baltovibe »The train hit the passenger side, and yet the driver died?
http://www.miami.com/mld/miami...4.htmQuote »Retired maitre d' of tony club in Miami killed at rail crossingAn 82-year-old Aventura man died in a train crash in Hallandale Beach Thursday when he drove his car onto the tracks -- and braked.BY DIANA MOSKOVITZ AND YUDY
PINEIROypineiro@MiamiHerald.comAs maitre d' at a ritzy lunch club for socialites and community leaders, Simon Clemens' job was to get to know everyone: where they sat, what they ate.And regulars -- who ranged from former U.S. Sen. George Smathers to Miami developer Armando Codina -- hailed Clemens as an irreplaceable fixture at the intimate weekly gatherings at the Hotel Inter-Continental.But on Thursday, the 82-year-old Aventura man, who worked for decades at the Standard Club until it closed in 1990, died when a train hit his car in Hallandale Beach.Clemens drove his white Pontiac Vibe around the down crossing gates about 8:30 a.m. -- and braked on the tracks near Southwest Third Street, police said.A Florida East Coast Railway train collided with the car and dragged it several blocks north to Hallandale Beach Boulevard, police spokesman Andrew Casper said.Clemens died on the scene. Police are investigating what happened.Before James Albert, head of a Miami construction firm, recruited him to run the Standard Club in 1961, Clemens was a headwaiter at Joe's Stone Crab in Miami Beach.At both establishments, he was revered for his hospitality.Besides being maitre d', the French-born Clemens was the keeper of the Standard Club's traditions.The Standard Club opened in the 1960s as an intimate gathering for Jewish social and community leaders at a time when the Miami Club turned Jews away. Peak membership: 425. They met for weekday lunches at Dupont Plaza Hotel.The club later moved to the River Park Hotel and then to the Pavillion Grill at the Inter-Continental. Among the club's most frequent and high-profile diners: Maurice Gusman, Judge A. Jay Cristol, publisher James Knight and lawyer Martin Fine.In a 1990 Miami Herald article on the closing of two ''Old World'' institutions, Clemens said: ``All these people, they're the backbone of the city. After all these years, you know what all these people like. I know my place, when to approach, when not to do it.''I think being in a car as it is hit by a train would probably give me a heart attack. It's hard to know how fragile this 82 year old Viber was.
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