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Freight train kills Fleming Island youth
By MARY MARAGHY, The Times-Union
May 16, 2008
A star Fleming Island High School football player was killed Wednesday night when he was struck by a freight train he was trying to outrun on a railroad bridge in Clay County.
Wesley Whiddon, 17, had been fishing with two teammates on a bridge that crosses Black Creek south of the Orange Park South neighborhood - a popular fishing hole, though it is private property and flanked with no-trespassing warning signs.
The boys were fishing from the middle of the 150-yard-long bridge, about 50 feet above the creek.
As a CSX freight train approached, the barefoot teens ran toward the embankment but only David Matthews, 18, and Richey Pickett, 17, made it safely, law enforcement officials said.
"They were boys being boys. Huck Finn," said Sheriff's Office detective Heather Pierce, who has a son on the football team. "There is no suspected foul play. No drugs or alcohol was involved.
Pierce said Matthews and Pickett were treated and released from a hospital Wednesday night.
Investigators are still trying to reconstruct exactly what happened, Pierce said.
Services for Whiddon will be at 2:30 p.m. Tuesday on the school's football field.
He was the son of W.C. Cherry Elementary School Principal Angie Whiddon and Wesley Whiddon Sr., a sergeant with the Green Cove Springs Police Department. He had three brothers, Heath, Seth and Walker.
Whiddon, who would have been a senior next school year, was a linebacker and "was definitely on his way to getting his college education paid for," Golden Eagles head football coach Neal Chipoletti said.
"God didn't bless him with a lot of speed or great size, but there were several midmajor and [Division] I-AA schools looking at him," Chipoletti said.
At 5-foot-10 and 215 pounds, Whiddon was a major force behind the Golden Eagles march to the Region I-5A championship game last season. His season total of 175 tackles was the fourth-best in the state, Chipoletti said. He also led the team in tackles his sophomore season with 89.
"He would have been our first four-year letterman," the coach said.
The Golden Eagles cancelled spring practice sessions Thursday and today. They will hold their regular Saturday morning scrimmage.
"My first reaction was to cancel spring and let us start back up in the summer," Chipoletti said. "Wesley was the type of kid, though, who would've been irate if we didn't practice. His mother insisted that we get back out there. I think it will help our kids to be around each other. We'll take a couple days off and then return to the field.
"We're going to finish up spring and play our game in his honor. And we'll play with only 10 men on defense."
A viewing will be from 4:30 to 8 p.m. Monday at Kirkwood Presbyterian Church on Shindler Drive at Argyle Forest Boulevard.
A fund has been set up at W.E. Cherry Elementary School, 420 Edson Drive, Orange Park, FL 32073. Checks payable to W.E. Cherry with Whiddon Bereavement Fund written in the memo line.
Times-Union sports writer Hays Carlyon contributed to this report.
mary.maraghy@jacksonville. com, (904) 366-6374
bill.johnson@jacksonville.com
(904) 366-6375
Copyright 2008
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