# Railroad Signals **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [June 27, 2002, 3:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/railroad-signals/116243 "2002-06-27T15:05:16Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 4\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Jake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/f475e1/32.png) [@Jake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jake)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2002, 3:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/railroad-signals/116243/1 "2002-06-27T15:05:16Z")
Do they work when there is a power failure? Do the signals the engineer sees work? I was crossing a track yesterday during a thunderstorm and wondered how would you know there is a power failure if you’re in a car? ---
**Author:** ![World\_Eater](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/f04885/32.png) [@World\_Eater](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/World_Eater)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2002, 6:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/railroad-signals/116243/2 "2002-06-27T18:04:15Z")
Try [here](http://home.internetcds.com/~xingman/crossingsigs/crossingsigs.html) I’m still wondering how the predictor works. Well back to google again. ---
**Author:** ![Jake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/f475e1/32.png) [@Jake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jake)\ **Post date:** [June 27, 2002, 7:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/railroad-signals/116243/3 "2002-06-27T19:43:57Z")
Thanks for the link. Looks like the “Predictor” has a battery backup. ---
**Author:** ![kpm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/c57346/32.png) [@kpm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kpm)\ **Post date:** [June 28, 2002, 2:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/railroad-signals/116243/4 "2002-06-28T02:58:13Z")
I have seen cases where thunderstorms actually trigger the crossing signals to go on and the arms to go down across the road when there is no train coming. In fact I saw that happen about 2 weeks ago on my way home from work.