When a train gets derailed, how do they re-rail it?
It’s going to depend on how badly the track, rolling stock and surrounding structures are damaged, and on how many people have been killed or injured, but generally they would use mobile cranes to get the rolling stock back on the track.
Why would the method of re-railing vary based on the number of deaths?
There is a cast iron gadget called a “re-railer” which can be used in some circumstances. If the derailed wheel is next to the track the re-railer is used to guide it back up onto the track.
Well, if there are deaths or injuries, the first priority is going to be getting the people out, not putting the train back on the tracks, and you probably would not want to use a crane in that process, since it would cause more injuries or deaths.
Oh, I get it. That makes sense.
Well, also, the number if deaths is likely to be somewhat proportional to the severity of the incident, and thus, inversely proportional to the potential for salvaging usable rolling stock.
The stretch of tracks from Mojave to Tehachapi (CA) must set some kind of record for derailings. I’ve driven that way a few times, and there always seems to be a derailed train laying somewhere along that line. These weren’t just sitting upright alongside the tracks, there were overturned or laying on their sides and seriously mangled. (These are all freight trains, no passengers involved.) I’m not sure there was much left worth re-railing, unless only to haul them away.
This is the same line, BTW, that also includes the world-famous Tehachapi Loop.
What if there are no roads around?
There must have been some kind of access to build the railway line. At the worst, you could bring in the vehicles and machinery that you need along the line itself. In some cases, access by boat might easiest.
Use the rails to get as close as you can, then drive the last few hundred yards over land. A lot of railway maintenance vehicles have a combination of steel railway wheels as well as road or all-terrain tyres, or caterpillar tracks. The railway wheels are lowered into position on the rails as required.
For larger cranes and maintenance stuff, you’d either put it on a low-loader type carriage and haul it as far as possible on the rails, or take it there in pieces and assemble on site.
Years ago, the railroads had wreck trains, complete with a crane that would come to the site to pick up the cars. They were expensive and inflexible, because when a car was put back on the track, you had to move everything to the nearest spur to set out the rerailed car to go back for more.
Today, the railroads call specialty contractors that bring sideboom tracked vehicles ('sidewinders") that were originally developed to lay pipelines to do the heavy lifting. Since they are not constrained to the track, the sidewinders are much more flexible and efficient.
Heavily damaged cars are typically pulled clear and scrapped on the spot at a later date. Lesser damaged cars that are not railworthy are loaded on flatcars and are taken to the the cars shops for repair or disposal. The rest are rerailed and hauled away in a train.
As far as access is concerned, most lines have an access road parallel to the track. In situations where there is no room, the sidewinders drive straight down the track to the wreck site. When Amtrak had to clean up the Bayou Canot wreck years ago, the work was done from the deck of several barges.
At a level crossing a half dozen blocks from where I lived, I once watched them trying to rerail a freight car that had somehow jumped the track (but not turned over or had any obvious damage). They kept trying to back it up onto what was obviously described as a rerailer above, but it wasn’t working. I had (illegally no doubt, but I was on foot and what the hell) crossed it during one of the motionless cogitations over what to do next) and stayed and watched, but eventually had to leave. When I came back an hour later, it was all cleared.
I think the big question is, do you want your money back?
mmm
Those derailed or overturned cars near Tehachapi may have been old cars deliberately placed there by the railroad to prevent erosion or as a windbreak.
Ya think? They sure looked like a wrecked train wreck to me. (This was some years ago, BTW.) Another time, there was a wrecked train like that at the bottom of the mountain near the town of Mojave.
I have to wonder how they clear a wreck with over head catenary wires in the way.
Those can be removed temporarily.
More often, taken down by the derailment to begin with.