Isn’t there some sort of law or something that Trains have to have some sort of deadman brake device? How did the power get throttled up with nobody on board?
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/ap/20010516/us/runaway_train_12.html
I would like to hear the outcome of that investigation.
From a Washington Post article:
So the alerter is not required, but if it’s there, you better not mess with it. Apparently, they haven’t ruled out sabotage yet.
My Father is an Engineer (or Hog-head as they like to be called… why, I don’t know) on CN railways. I used to go with him every now and then on trips (when it was allowed, its not anymore). They have a device now that rings an alarm at some random time, it could be twice a minute, once in 5. Every time this “alarm” rings, they have to hit a button to reset it. If they fail too, the train goes into full emergency and stops. I think it was made mandatory after a Via passenger train collided with a CN freight train (or the other way around) in Hinton, Alberta years ago. A good idea, IMHO. It pretty much assures that there is always someone at the controls.
When I heard this news report all I could think about were the movies Runaway Train and Silver Streak. In the latter the villain had to put a toolbox on top of what looked like the gas pedal to keep the train going. In the former some other accident kept the engine going. I realize that it is not a good idea to get your information from the movies, but iot certainly seemed reasonable that the locomotives wouldn’t keep going without some sort of active input from the engineer driving it.
There has been a considerable amount of debate on Trainorders.com as to the cause of the incident. Some of the contributions have come from CSX employees, posting anonymously. Disclaimer: much information is speculative, pending the results of the various investigations now under way.
Three primary factors apparently allowed the train to move off on its own: 1) the locomotive, CSX 8888, was not equipped with an Alertor (this is not uncommon on older locomotives which tend to be used as trailing units in multi-unit lashups); 2) the air-operated train brakes were not applied; 3) while there is some disagreement on the exact circumstances, the locomotive throttle may not have been in the idle position.
According to reports I have read, just prior to the incident the locomotive was attached to the train by a yard crew who were then instructed to move the loco+train (using their own yard units) over to another track in preparation for a later departure. Assuming this was the case, it is typical practice to set the independent (locomotive-only) air brake, and apply the hand brakes on the locomotive(s) and first few cars, on the idled train. This may not have been done, or the crew may only have applied the hand brake on the locomotive, which would be insufficient to hold the train if for some reason the locomotive throttle were opened.
If the train brakes were not applied, this was because either a) no one had connected the locomotive’s air hose to the train air line and opened the angle cocks (valves), or b) the train air brakes were left disengaged to avoid having to pump up the system at departure time.
There remain many questions as to how the train got under way in the first place. It will be interesting to see the results of the investigation.
I heard a CSX spokeswoman on NPR this evening who said (and I don’t know squat about trains, so some of y’all who do may be able to flesh this out a bit) that the operator believed he had set all three brake systems, but he had in fact set two and had the third in the throttle position (?) when he dismounted the locomotive. The spokeswoman made the analogy of having a foot on the brake and a foot on the gas. FWIW.
What I’d like to know is how the CSX employee who stopped it managed to board it.
CSX ran a second locomotive up behind the train, hooked it up, and applied the brakes. The engineer on the second train said they hit the runaway with a speed differential of two or three MPH: Pretty ballsy. Once the runaway had been dragged down to about 10 MPH, an engineer that had been pacing the train in a car got ahead to the next crossing, and boarded the train as it passed: Very ballsy.
This guy stood 20 feet from a running train and used a high-powered rifle to shoot the gas tank. Now, granted, it’s diesel, and granted, it wasn’t too likely to explode, but which moron thought it was a good idea to put a .30 cal. hole in a 1500 gallon gas tank and that would somehow help? and this is a LAW ENFORCEMENT OFFICIAL. I generally have nothing but respect for the Law, as it were, but this guy needs to be back walking a beat.
b.
Oh, yeah, and kudos to the ballsy guys who stepped up to the plate and fixed this.
CSX corp. does not use crew-call alerters on all of it’s locomotives. They obviously don’t use conductors or brakeman on all of them either or this never would have happened. Cost- cutting at it’s finest!
So does the couple (that may not be correct train terminology) automatically engage when pressed against another, or did some CSX employee have to be out on the front of the pursuing locomotive to make the connection?
As to the cop trying to sever the fuel line (that’s exposed?), the CSX spokeswoman said he used a shotgun (may be incorrect); one way or another I would suspect he didn’t try that solely on his own initiative. But I don’t know that.
I didn’t get a good look at the diesel, but I’ve seen my share, General Motors’ Electro-Motive division is one of my customers and I’ve seen a lot of diesels constructed. On none of them is a fuel line anywhere NEAR to being exposed. For good reason- a deadfall oak branch near a track would scrape off a hose in a moment. The tanks on diesels are big belly tanks, for the most part, and made out of some damned heavy steel (like 3/8" or 1/2")to PREVENT punctures. The short glimpse I did see sure looked like the guy was using a rifle- shot from a shotgun would just bounce off one of those fuel tanks. And you’re right, if it wasn’t his own idea, his BOSS should be writing parking tickets.
I’m with you, Rat, the cost cutting is getting ridiculous. Myself, I miss cabooses. Cabeese? several caboose? EOTD’s are just not romantic.
b.
A few corrections to my earlier post:
CSX 8888 apparently IS equipped with an Alertor,
but…
The CSX Trainmaster who boarded the locomotive and stopped it reportedly found the following:
Throttle: Run 8 (effectively wide open)
Independent (locomotive) air brake: fully engaged (this actually shuts off the Alertor, so the engine can idle unmanned)
Train air brakes: 20 pound reduction (partially applied).
The partial brake application was why the train did not exceed about 40 mph, even though the throttle was wide open.
There is a dynamic (electrical resistance) brake on such locomotives, but this is used to augment braking effort on downgrades and was not a factor in the runaway.
US-style couplers are automatic as long as the couplers are properly aligned and both knuckles are open. The train must already be stopped, however, to hook up the air lines. The locomotive that caught up to the runaway used a combination of independent and dynamic braking to slow the train enough for the other employee to swing aboard the 8888 and shut it down.
BTW, the maneuver where the crew caught up to the runaway and coupled on is actually relatively safe if there is time to do it; I personally witnessed a successful ‘catch’ one night while working for a short line in Pennsylvania.
Is this like the deal with the Navy commander of the sub that sank a Japanese fishing boat off Hawaii a month or so ago? While I heard kudos for the operator’s (not sure if he was an Engineer or not) efforts at regaining access to the runaway, is his career as a train driver now smoke?
[Sigmund Freud]
Und zo, zee little train is abused as a toy, zen it grows up to be a runaway train.
[/Sigmund Freud]
According to two CP engineers out of Kamloops, British Columbia, that shared a bottle of Jameson Irish Whiskey with my lover and I at a coastal Oregon campground one night, a train’s crew consists of;
“One hoghead, one steamhead, one bonehead and two pinheads.”
Thus:
Hoghead = The engineer who operates the hog (similar to a hogshead (large cask), or boiler?
Steamhead = The fireman who stokes the steam engine’s boiler.
Bonehead = The conductor who rattles the bones (the clicking of the ticket punch).
Pinhead = The pinheads are the last two in the crew the brakeman and his assistant who handle the coupling pins.
[sup]And, yeah, I’d bet on the guy’s career being toast, even if he did make the “catch”.[/sup]
Probably, but you never know… if he has enough seniority the Brotherhood will probably support him enough to let him keep his job. You know unions: support the older guy who makes lots of mistakes, fire the talented new guy when there has to be job cuts
Something that really steams me about the discussions at Trainorders is the railroad ‘employees’ that are bithing that a ‘Trainmaster’ was the one that shut down the runaway… and then go on to state that the crew of the chase loco would probably be cited for breaking rules for doing it. How paranoid are these people?
Didn’t make the catch… that was the crew of a freight that the runaway passed enroute.
Well, OK, closing with another train to perform a ‘catch’ isn’t as dangerous to the profesionals as it looks to me, but still, 10’s of thousands of pouonds of locomotive, running-up on 100’s of thousands of pounds of train would shake my knees.
As for the crew that caught the runaway, and the trainmaster that boarded it, as best I can tell, none of them were involved in letting it escape in the first place, but I bet the guys who were responsible are gonna find themselves in the CSX version of Siberia…
Here’s a long story from the Toledo Blade that basically reaffirms what beatle heard.
The short version is that the engineer had to pull three brake levers. Instead, he pulled two, and mistakenly pulled the throtle wide open.
Pulling the brake lever disabled the alertor, as was noted above.
As for the deputy firing the shotgun, apparently he was trying to play sharpshooter and shoot out a switch that would have disabled the train. The article said the railroad agreed with the idea – although by that time they were probably saying “what the hell, it couldn’t make anything worse.”
I also understand there was a Plan C (Plan A was the derailing, which they decided not to do, and Plan B was hooking an engine on the back to slow it down, which did work.) Plan C was to put another engine in AHEAD of the train and, I suppose, see if a train wreck would have stopped it.
To add one ‘fact’ to the discussion: My local news said that the boarding of the runaway was assisted by waiting until it was climbing a grade, which must have made it a lot easier for the following locomotive to slow it down enough.
Uh, I would assume they’d put an engine ahead of it to match speeds and allow the runaway to gain slowly until they coupled and then brake to slow that way.
–Tim
Ok this joke press release was running around on Mr. Gadgetgirl’s train board, I thought I’d share with the class. I figure at least Rocket88 will find it funny…
May 15, 2001
Due to the escalation of fuel prices and the dwindling economy, CSX Transportation, in its continuing efforts to reduce the work force and conserve money, announced today that it would run trains without crews. The first trial run was a 70 mile run from Ohio to Kentucky.
Although the media was alerted to a so-called “runaway train,” an unidentified spokesman for CSX said all was going well until some knuckle-headed “hero” jumped onto the train and applied the brakes. CSX estimates that over all savings from running trains with no crews would spur the economy and cause their stock to skyrocket. “We just wanted to be the first to run trains without crews, we heard the Norfolk Southern motto was to be employee free in 2003 so we decided we better get on the band wagon.”
I love the “employee free in 2003” bit.