Santa fe derailment Las Animas Jct March 1984

[mudchicken]

SFbrkmn

Mud, you likely know the rest of story. Head brakeman actually resigned over the incident. Rehired w/BNSF in late 90s and retired last yr.

 

I didn't know. (and I'd only been on the property for 3 1/2 years, still pretty green.) Slowly the memories of that are coming back, CDOT snowplow convoys and all. That was 36 hours of misery for us until the snow finally quit... then it all quickly became muddy spring slop. The night images were wild - people just vanished or appeared less than 50 feet from you in the whiteness. A year or so after that had another derailment with a train going the other way at the same general area (two boxcars full of Coors beer torn to shreds at the Las Animas AV Branch wye switch - The asset protection/claim agents wound up digging a hole and crushing/destroying the beer right there - the local vatos were in tears...the smell lingered for months)

I also remember measuring back from the POD in that derailment all the way back to old Gilpin siding (top of the hill above Ruxton) so the Trainmaster and the RFE could see where things happened according to the event recorder. Taught me many lessons about the reliability of Pulse event recorders - don't tell me they had any reliable precision, I'll just laugh. (+/-  two football fields is precise?)

[SFbrkmn]

Mud, you likely know the rest of story. Head brakeman actually resigned over the incident. Rehired w/BNSF in late 90s and retired last yr.

[mudchicken]

I was there. I've got slides buried in a box somewhere.

More later...

(1) IIRC Train 594 , Ft. Worth-Amarillo-La Junta-Denver expedited merchandise & TOFC.

(Coming off Boise City Sub (49MPH/TWC Dark) at Las Animas Jcn. (La Junta Sub/ 1st District/90 MPH CTC interlocking plant)

(2) Late afternnoon/ early evening/ heavy blowing snow (started wet and eventually was powder) blowing snow.....a little over a foot of snow, but the wind was making 2-3 ft drifts.

(3) site did not yet have new snorkel type switch heaters and blowers. Old oil fired kerosene  pots w/o blowers still in the cribs at the power switches. They were working - but overmatched by the snow. (later found one of the pots floating in the ditch having melted the surrounding ice)

(4) Train went by the fixed approach (yellow), then approach (yellow) in the compound curves at LA Jcn. ad 35 MPH.

Unknown to the engineer, there was snow and ice between the stock rails and sw. points at the junction switch. Would not completely close. This was true at both the junction switch and the facing point siding switch just west of the junction switch. 

(5) Locomotive engineer did NOT slow down (enough) for approach yellow. Vision was awful (ground blizzard), some think he missed the fixed approach and took the approach signal as the fixed signal. Did not see next signal was red until very late or not at all.

(6) Split the siding switch at almost 35 MPH at the siding switch at which point all hell broke loose. Lead engine jackknifed the engine consist and rolled over 45 degrees + (wasn't totally on it's side)....Everything else piled-in behind. Locomotive dug a hole up to the base of the short hood (front platform deck)- I took a photo of Roadmaster Goodall sitting on the diamondplate at the front stantion and railingwith his  feet propped-up on the plowed ballast & dirt.

(7) Two CTC switches destroyed, a searchlight signal pushed over at a crazy angle, rail bowed out under the locomotives and cars. 39 foot Sampson switch point broken into 2+ pieces and bent up like a pretzel ...All of this in a hard to access area in the Arkansas River bottoms on the east side of Las Animas. (Kelner jetties didn't help matters much  - kept you up on top of a 15 ft tall fill, big ditch on south side of the fill)

(8) Then the "fun" began. (snowstorm got worse)

(8)

[SFbrkmn]

Perhaps Mud can shed some light on subject. Anyone have details of the SF wreck in a March 1984 blizzard @ Las Animas Jct in which an eng overturned on its side? Yrs removed from working the Garden City Rd swtchr for several yrs, one of my now long co-workers was in that caboom and stated when the eng turned over, it was like a slow motion event.