Safety First perhaps:
I should take this opportunity to mention to any PF readers that there is normally an 800 number printed on the mechanical box for the crossing gates. Had the truck driver found time to call that number with a cell, it might only take a minute or less for the train dispatcher to radio the train and warn it in plenty of time for the train to make a safe, planned stop. Seconds count, like near runway mishaps at airports.
Astronuc said:
I found another link to a CBS affiliate - with conflicting information on that derailment. The CBS article mentions 8 cars are off the tracks at the rear of the train, but other articles state 21 cars derailed, so presumably, 13 of the derailed cars stayed on the tracks. It looks like a unit train of autoracks, which seem to be bilevels carrying SUVs and pickups.
https://www.wlky.com/article/train-carrying-cars-derails-hardin-county-glendale-kentucky/43340951#
No hazmat was involved, but in the middle of town, one autorack hit a building and another autorack his an occupied vehicle; one person had minor injuries according to police.
It's odd that rear cars would derail, unless the didn't have brakes applied and their momentum cause them to pivot off those case that were stopped or braking.Run-in forces have been a problem for decades. Back in 1974, D&H had a train that went into emergency when center sill and draft gear failed on car 4 (couplers between cars 3 and 4 separated). The locomotives instigated emergency stop, but cars from 4 on back didn't stop, and they ran into the front end on a 3° 30' curve. The lead coupler on car 4 was add an odd vertical angle, since the car was heavily loaded, and apparently it was pushed to the point the outside rail was pushed out of gauge, as well as being overturned for some length.
NTSB/RAR-83/05 -
https://rosap.ntl.bts.gov/view/dot/45449/dot_45449_DS1.pdfI believe there was an issue with the track in that the rail was not properly secured. D&H was struggling financially (fuel prices greatly increased due to OPEC oil embargo), and like many railroads at the time, they deferred maintenance on the track, structures and cars.The car in question was only 5 years old. It had a capacity of 264k lbs.
Thanks for the reply, Astronuc
Quote: "It's odd that rear cars would derail, unless the didn't have brakes applied and their momentum cause them to pivot off those case that were stopped or braking."
From the video, I see that this was not a unit train, but mixed freight. It's a bit blurry, but I see at least one black tank car towards the front of the train (@0:45 sec remaining) as the video pans forward to the guilty perp-truck on the crossing.
I don't know what cars may be behind the rest of the auto-racks, but this type loaded railcars are relatively light compared to many loads. If some heavier cars are behind lighter cars, the middle lighter cars can literally "pop out" from the middle of a train like peanut butter from between two suddenly squeezed crackers. Again, for those not familiar, train air brakes set up right away behind the engines and the air release signal delay thereafter slowly travels towards the end of the still moving train as the front of the train begins to stop.
The result of the brake delay gradient is, if there is any slack in couplers, heavy rear cars smash against front cars, in this case often lighter cars. Derailments happen from this delay effect even when all cars weigh the same, but the effect is much worse when heavy cars are on the rear. One might imagine a string of rowboats connected by short ropes, all pulled by the lead rowboat which is the only one under power. Some in front are loaded, some rear loaded, but empties in the middle. A single large ship would be easier.
This load distribution effect is one of the things that an attempt was made to remedy, only after I began working RR.
Ordinarily, cars were always switched out to build a train so that the first job-car to be dropped off, or multiple car set-out, was on the rear of the train and the arrangement continued in this logical successive manner to save time from randomly digging out cars. When it dawned on detached management that weight arrangements were costing more than labor, an attempt was made to arrange cars with the heaviest blocks of cars to the front. This helped cure part of the slack problem we just discussed above because theoretically, only light cars ran into only heavy cars. But the labor increased because now a block of cars to dig out often required part of the train to be cut-off (parked from) the train on the main line and hand brakes laboriously tied, while the desired set-out, now on the rear, was pulled forward, past the set-out switch and then backed up into the spur track.
Hand brakes must be tied on the set-out of course and then only the main train is pulled out of the spur and backed to the block of cars still on the main line. Once this coupling is made, air is slowly pumped back up from zero brake-pipe and hand brakes untied. An FRA air test must now be legally made on this rear block because it has been without air for a period. This type switching is often all done near facilities and populations likely have a crossing nearby, perhaps a now blocked crossing (the bane of commuters), and so a crew judgment must be made whether a blocked crossing should be cut for traffic convenience by splitting the train up even more. Finally, the train is back together whole, FRA tested and on it's way to the next set-out and the circus sets back up.
This may seem excessive detail to have said all this, but now the reader may realize why some cheating may happen instead of perfectly arranging all the cars into possibly safer, but significantly more time consuming, train movement arrangements.
Offhand, air brakes all applied in unison by electric cable as mentioned earlier, would have very likely prevented this costly accident in Kentucky. That is if a panicked conductor did not dump the air pipe in terror, but rather a calm, confident, well equipped engineer was allowed to set safer brakes from his or her upgraded control stand. Note the train above stopped not far from impact. I have dumped air (just in time) as a conductor and as an engineer, both split-second intuitive decisions that prevented serious impacts, and now I am still alive to tell it. If the conductor had any doubt of the engineer's judgement, he or she did the right thing. How much further would the train have traveled in a half second later than the dump? What was in the truck?
Some trivia. One day, in the Mandan terminal, one of the carmen had posted a picture on the bulletin board. It was a picture taken by a trackside detector on the east edge of Bismarck. Since Mandan was a major car repair facility, the detector had an added private feature to video/audio inspect incoming cars. A car inspector listened for the thump of flat spots, cars that may need new wheels, but also observed cars for the car numbers to ID them. The posted still picture was a freeze-frame of the coupling between two westbound cars that had their mutual couplers temporarily jacked up in a vee from buff forces, the wheels about a foot above the tracks in midair.
What had obviously happened was an engineer had suddenly realized too late, that he or she was traveling far too fast for the RR city (yard limit) speed limit sign (35mph) and said engineer probably went to full dynamic brake and a panic, full 10-pound set of airbrakes at 40-50mph, instead of a gradual brake plan. The resulting severe slack run-in jacked the car ends up. Amazingly, the cars set back down on their wheels just right because no
permanent derailment occurred.
I used to listen to that detector wheel report, trains and track warrants with my portable radio, to estimate my departure calls. Should I sleep now? Do I have time to mow the lawn first?
Some more trivia. My company sent me to
Johnson County Community College in Kansas City for some training and one of the instructors related a story about a truck that he had supposedly hit, a truck that pulled right in front of him and was moving when he hit it. It was a tanker carrying gasoline. He dumped the air and had the presence of mind to quickly get out of his seat and hit an emergency kill button on the back wall of the cab that shut off all the locomotives right before they hit. The fuel tanker blew apart upon impact, easily shattered the reinforced cab windshield and enough gasoline drenched the crew to the point that one could have measured the depth of fuel on the floor in inches before it dribbled away.
Fortunately, it did not ignite, and they stayed on the track. It still took a half mile to stop after impact. He said the adrenaline caused him to recklessly jump from the locomotive and insanely rush back intending to properly assault the fool truck driver that tried to rob his family. By the time he got back there the insane moment had passed and he ended up assisting the mildly injured driver. The tractor had spun around violently from the trailer collision.
-----------------
Quote: "
The locomotives instigated emergency stop, but cars from 4 on back didn't stop, and they ran into the front end on a 3° 30' curve."
There are three brake levers in every locomotive. One is vertical on the conductors side and is pushed ahead to dump the air. Both the other two are on the engineers control stand. They are also moved ahead, horizontally, for desired braking. One lever is for the Main train brakes which is what we have mostly discussed so far. The other, very nearby lever is for the Independent brakes which are all MU'd (multiple units) together with others in the Consist to brake all connected engines simultaneously.
The Independent brake applies all locomotive brakes in joined engines (consist) but does not affect the Main train brakes. But when the Main brakes are applied, the engine brakes automatically follow the train brakes. This condition is usually undesired as it is better to leave the locomotive brakes off to save their wear etc. For instance, when the locomotive is disconnected from the train, a worn-out engine brake could mean surprise... no engine brakes left. For that reason, it is a rule to
Actuate (and save) the engine brakes whenever train brakes are used. Actuate in this instance means to push the Independent lever down (it's spring loaded) whereby all the locomotive cylinders dump their air so that the locomotive brakes are off.
Here's the catch. When the train goes into auto-emergency (wth, trainline opened), the surprised engineer may forget to Actuate the locomotive brakes off. In such a case, the *
heavy locomotive may continue to inadvertently coast with some light Independent brakes on. The problem happens thus: If the emergency air loss in the middle of the train causes a run-out break-in-two on the head end and the rear train brakes fail to remain set, the following train cars may run back into the slowing 'Independent braked' front section of the train. Entering a curve also impedes RR cars and engines. Because of a possible long-distance run-up gain, the run-in may be a lot harder than a short distance slack run-in and can injure the crew. The reason the rest of the train did not stop is a mystery to me, a nightmare in the making. Perhaps a crushed glad hand, a kinked brake-pipe and/or a traveling brake-pipe pressure wave that signaled a release on a trainline that did not ever fully dump. Brrr.
*Almost all locomotives weigh in at about 415k pounds. It seems to be the safe limit of metallic contact pressure distributed by twelve large diameter wheels, because of wheel/rail metallurgy. Compare that engine weight to the 264K lbs. of just one car (you mentioned earlier) and multiply by over a hundred cars. Now you can better realize why all locomotives have always had traction control since day-1. If the traction control fails, the affected axle will spin and burn a trough in the rail, right through the ball, down into the web within seconds and your day is done. All draft forces provided by locomotives are limited by traction only. They have enough torque to pull so much more than they can ever find traction to do.
I once climbed a hill, it seemed forever, in light rain with a heavy mixed freight (14k ton?), whereas I topped the hill at .2 mph using copious sand. Yes, trains sometimes slip on wet track. Yes, the speedos are that precise (for coal loaders) and the locomotives, two large GEs, kept reducing power until they finally quit slipping at .2 mph. The masterplan was to limit the horsepower of trains on my sub to 2hp per ton and the numb powers that be, decided to give me two newer 4400 hp engines instead of three or four old 2000 hp jeeps. The smaller old engines would have given me the traction (weight-on-drivers) to top the hill at about 6 to 8 mph, if they didn't die enroute which was quite common. There were other times when I just stalled or old DC traction motors timed out on amperage (per operator calculation, me) on what was known as short-time ratings. One then waited for an oncoming train, or a train from behind, to cut off their power and help. They hated it but where could they go?
-----------------
Propane trucks, gasoline trucks, gravel trucks, even moose. Families going to church. All these could ruin a RR's day at least and all days at most.
A former coworker, a friend of mine, who was also an engineer was involved in no less than three fatalities and at least one derailment from an equipment strike, none of which were in any way her fault. She was also the one whose errant axle secretly ate through a rail. I would guess that any train crew member who has worked more than a couple of years on the road has suffered some sort of close call.
For me the luck of Greek gods, no fatalities at least. The worst, an incompetent conductor and his helper once nearly backed me into a train while I was loaded with 80 loads of coal and thereby changed RR radio communication forever. But for another error made earlier in the day by others, we would have impacted an Amtrak passenger train, probably a center-punch. The new system CEO called the terminal. Train service is a good example of long hours of boredom punctuated with occasional brief moments of terror. But sometimes a panic lasted days while one waited to see if they still had a job, after some coworker made a serious mistake. Usually everybody in the crew went down together. But I had maybe 50 favorable witnesses on radio, all engineers.
There are so many different RR errors that may occur and will probably always occur, that I think
yes, we should improve obsolete train brakes for one thing. But I think the worst hazmat should also entail slowing down, especially near populations. Think what would happen if we were all allowed to drive interstate auto speeds inside our cities. With new technologies available, why must RR's be allowed this type insanity?
Locomotives have been ICE/electric hybrids since the 1950's. They were inspired by world war diesel/electric submarine technology. Some lesser dynamic brakes appeared on older DC locomotives. The newer AC locomotives have excellent dynamic brakes that revert the traction motors into generators to provide extensive wheel drag by converting generated wheel electricity to heat. We the RR, probably heat 'toaster grids' every trip with enough wasted energy to heat my home for a year. The grid exhaust can be seen on top many road locomotives as short, flat round towers and the loud noise they make is from the powerful fans used to cool them.
If corporate RR is worried about wasting fuel by allowing too good of braking, why can't RR have at least one rail car of storage batteries, dedicated to capturing the wasted energy of slowing for safety, instead of the usual venting it directly to our overheating atmosphere? Except for it's nickel-metal hydride battery, my trusty Prius uses the same solid-state technology as the new AC locomotives. The Toyota Prius Hybrid is currently the highest performance production auto in the world... ICE efficiency-wise at least. I've always liked hot-rods.
Thanks,
--wes
