The FRA recently performed an Inspection Blitz at Bailey Yd. in North Platte, NE.
The results should be embarassing. The story in the North Platte Bulletin is here
North Platte Bulletin
So many interesting items. I liked the part where various managers asked the FRA inspectors to leave the property.
Jeff
duplicate
Also we have the FRA accident report that 9 cars of a derailed train had flatt wheels that should have been replaced or turned to true if possible.
FRA safety advisory urges railroads to properly identify, repair high-impact wheels - Trains
jeffhergert So many interesting items. I liked the part where various managers asked the FRA inspectors to leave the property. Jeff
In the past, FRA has "appeared" without properly identifying themselves when setting foot on the property. Before condemning the local adult supervision, a little more investigating and questioning needs to be done. Walking around on railroad property like you own the place without the proper protection and failing to follow procedure can get somebody killed. FRA may have been in the wrong and the UP supervisor(s) may have been doing the right thing.
mudchickenWalking around on railroad property like you own the place without the proper protection and failing to follow procedure can get somebody killed.
Ah, yes, the "I am the law" syndrome...
Larry Resident Microferroequinologist (at least at my house) Everyone goes home; Safety begins with you My Opinion. Standard Disclaimers Apply. No Expiration Date Come ride the rails with me! There's one thing about humility - the moment you think you've got it, you've lost it...
mudchicken jeffhergert So many interesting items. I liked the part where various managers asked the FRA inspectors to leave the property. Jeff In the past, FRA has "appeared" without properly identifying themselves when setting foot on the property. Before condemning the local adult supervision, a little more investigating and questioning needs to be done. Walking around on railroad property like you own the place without the proper protection and failing to follow procedure can get somebody killed. FRA may have been in the wrong and the UP supervisor(s) may have been doing the right thing.
Editor Emeritus, This Week at Amtrak
It's hardly just FRA. State officials can be every bit as bad (Wisconsin RR Commissioner and California Forestry from the past come to mind). Be there for the right reason and properly protected for safety purposes and there should not be issues.
Again, a little more investigation by the newsworker in the linked article would have been interesting to see.
tree68 mudchicken Walking around on railroad property like you own the place without the proper protection and failing to follow procedure can get somebody killed. Ah, yes, the "I am the law" syndrome...
mudchicken Walking around on railroad property like you own the place without the proper protection and failing to follow procedure can get somebody killed.
I hate doing accident surveys. It usually means somebody's failed and that somebody may have become an undesired statistic in the fatality or injury column.
I was not aware that anyone could actually assert "we haven't been able to get to them yet" as a justification for operating locomotives that fail FRA operability criteria...
OvermodI was not aware that anyone could actually assert "we haven't been able to get to them yet" as a justification for operating locomotives that fail FRA operability criteria...
Engineers, in accordance with multiple rules, are required to make a 'Calendar Day' inspection of the locomotives they operate. In making the inspection, if they discover a FRA defect they have the authority to 'shop' the locomotive until the defect(s) are repaired.
Never too old to have a happy childhood!
OH BOY, having an engineer order a locomotive to be shopped when the train he to be on is ready to go would make the yardmaster, trainmaster and other managers REALLY HAPPY. I can imagine how loud they would scream because a hotshot train has to be held up while another engine is found to replace the bad order one. If it happens to be a UPS or J. B. Hunt train the railroad would have to pay a VERY hefty penalty because the train is not on time.
caldreamer OH BOY, having an engineer order a locomotive to be shopped when the train he to be on is ready to go would make the yardmaster, trainmaster and other managers REALLY HAPPY. I can imagine how loud they would scream because a hotshot train has to be held up while another engine is found to replace the bad order one. If it happens to be a UPS or J. B. Hunt train the railroad would have to pay a VERY hefty penalty because the train is not on time.
It happens. Some minor defects allow an engine to be used, but not as a leader. Unless it can be fixed, which is getting harder when you cut off mechanical people, a little rearranging is in order.
I've always had FRA people in the field identify themselves, especially before safety vests were common. It wouldn't surprise me if some of those out west thought FRA inspectors were like the one in the movie "Unstoppable."
jeffhergert caldreamer OH BOY, having an engineer order a locomotive to be shopped when the train he to be on is ready to go would make the yardmaster, trainmaster and other managers REALLY HAPPY. I can imagine how loud they would scream because a hotshot train has to be held up while another engine is found to replace the bad order one. If it happens to be a UPS or J. B. Hunt train the railroad would have to pay a VERY hefty penalty because the train is not on time. It happens. Some minor defects allow an engine to be used, but not as a leader. Unless it can be fixed, which is getting harder when you cut off mechanical people, a little rearranging is in order. I've always had FRA people in the field identify themselves, especially before safety vests were common. It wouldn't surprise me if some of those out west thought FRA inspectors were like the one in the movie "Unstoppable." Jeff
I will second Jeff's statements. Engineers DO SHOP engines for observed FRA defects. One thing everyone tends to overlook - Engineers are laying their lives on the line in operating defective locomotives, not just their job. The items that a locomotive can be shopped for are SERIOUS defects, in and of their own right.
One thing my carrier did was attempt to put their newest most reliable engines on their HOT trains in an effort to preempt engines having FRA defects that can cause the engine to be legitmately shopped by engineers.
JayBee The FRA recently performed an Inspection Blitz at Bailey Yd. in North Platte, NE. The results should be embarassing. The story in the North Platte Bulletin is here North Platte Bulletin
Sadly on here, it's once again "blame the messenger" or inspectors. My impression as someone living near (so hearing) the UP mainline has been one of many UP locomotives needing serious engine work (less so with visiting NW ones) and many freight cars with wheels well out of true. Hearing is believing. Laying off mechanical workers in the shop (deferred or never maintenance) is a recipe for serious problems. All part of a cost-cutting, maximize short-term profits philosophy.
charlie hebdoSadly on here, it's once again "blame the messenger" or inspectors. My impression as someone living near (so hearing) the UP mainline has been one of many UP locomotives needing serious engine work (less so with visiting NW ones) and many freight cars with wheels well out of true. Hearing is believing. Laying off mechanical workers in the shop (deferred or never maintenance) is a recipe for serious problems. All part of a cost-cutting, maximize short-term profits philosophy.
I have to say I am becomming more and more a fan of CP management over UP managemant and am even rebalancing my stock portfolio slowly in that direction. I find the new CP marketing proposals highly innovative and aggressive. UP once upon a time used to be that way but it started to fade after they merged with SP. I think CP might end up buying some UP lines sooner or later. Pehaps even force a sale via the Feds with the argument that CP could do better and it would be for the public good.........we'll see.
charlie hebdo JayBee The FRA recently performed an Inspection Blitz at Bailey Yd. in North Platte, NE. The results should be embarassing. The story in the North Platte Bulletin is here North Platte Bulletin Sadly on here, it's once again "blame the messenger" or inspectors. My impression as someone living near (so hearing) the UP mainline has been one of many UP locomotives needing serious engine work (less so with visiting NW ones) and many freight cars with wheels well out of true. Hearing is believing. Laying off mechanical workers in the shop (deferred or never maintenance) is a recipe for serious problems. All part of a cost-cutting, maximize short-term profits philosophy.
The thing to remember about FRA and similar governmental inspectors - The MUST find failures or they will be out of a job in short order.
BaltACD charlie hebdo JayBee The FRA recently performed an Inspection Blitz at Bailey Yd. in North Platte, NE. The results should be embarassing. The story in the North Platte Bulletin is here North Platte Bulletin Sadly on here, it's once again "blame the messenger" or inspectors. My impression as someone living near (so hearing) the UP mainline has been one of many UP locomotives needing serious engine work (less so with visiting NW ones) and many freight cars with wheels well out of true. Hearing is believing. Laying off mechanical workers in the shop (deferred or never maintenance) is a recipe for serious problems. All part of a cost-cutting, maximize short-term profits philosophy. The thing to remember about FRA and similar governmental inspectors - The MUST find failures or they will be out of a job in short order.
EuclidWhat if they are not finding failures because they are doing their job?
Having undergone "white glove inspections" in the military - if they want to find something, they will.
Very often, if things are looking good over all, inspectors will overlook minor items (a few spots of oil on the walkway, perhaps), but if they feel they have a reason, they'll get pretty tight.
While regular visits are hardly out of the ordinary, and if there is a friendly tenor to the visit on both sides, many potential violations may result in "recommendations" instead of write-ups. Most inspectors aren't out to shut down the railroad.
Things are gonna break, leak, and otherwise malfunction. They understand that.
EuclidSource? What if they are not finding failures because they are doing their job? What is the evidence in this flat wheel case that indicates that the FRA did not find a legitimate problem?
I am one of those guys (not at the FRA), but I'm the "doing the inspecting" side of the coin.
If we don't find a problem, we move on. There's no need to nitpick or create a problem. There's plenty of other problems we already know about to go work on. There's no need to find problems to create job security when you can just go down your list to the next place you think there could be an issue.
BaltACDThe thing to remember about FRA and similar governmental inspectors - The MUST find failures or they will be out of a job in short order.
Like there's ever going to be a lack of failures. Better chance of the sun not coming up, or the spell checker on here working.
The opinions expressed here represent my own and not those of my employer, any other railroad, company, or person.
mudchickenIn the past, FRA has "appeared" without properly identifying themselves when setting foot on the property. Before condemning the local adult supervision, a little more investigating and questioning needs to be done. Walking around on railroad property like you own the place without the proper protection and failing to follow procedure can get somebody killed. FRA may have been in the wrong and the UP supervisor(s) may have been doing the right thing.
Every FRA/utility guy I ever met IDs themselves. And they are regulators, so it prob. wouldn't be a good idea to send a 2 week written invitation to ask to look at something.
zugmannEvery FRA/utility guy I ever met IDs themselves. And they are regulators, so it prob. wouldn't be a good idea to send a 2 week written invitation to ask to look at something.
The NY version of OSHA - PESH - has two branches of interest to fire departments. The enforcement arm is going to ding you for what's wrong. Usually, it's a warning - fix it and we're good. If it's really egregarious, fines, etc.
The compliance arm is the folks you want to invite. While they can ding you if something is wrong, the usual emphasis is what you need to fix.
Sometimes they come in with an agenda - usually it involves a recent change. Several years ago, the local PESH inspector came to visit us. At the top of his list was a newly promulgated respiratory policy (self contained breathing apparatus). It so happened that I (fire chief at the time) had learned about the change and put together a policy. Mainly, that involved changing the boilerplate to cover our fire department), but we had it in hand. That, and a copy of our SOPs, made him happy, and we didn't hear from him again.
Transport Canada doesn't do anywhere near as many inspections as the FRA, but when they do show up they will be in a vehicle with the TC logo and name written on both sides. And if they venture out into the yard they will absolutely be wearing full PPE.
As Zug mentioned, the whole point of inspections and audits is that they are unexpected.
Greetings from Alberta
-an Articulate Malcontent
I like reading our internal recrew report. It has a short, often incomplete, explanation of why a train needed a recrew. (I always read what they wrote when I've been recrewed.) I was reading about one train. It had a multitude of problems, power not ready, train not ready, etc. Then it said, "...and then the FRA showed up."
As I recall I think they had to set out 6 or 7 cars that the FRA bad ordered before they could depart.
As to locomotives, some Federal defects are easy to fix. I do it quite often. I've even seen a picture of the defect I'm thinking about on the cover of the trade magazine "Railway Age" with two senior officers of an eastern railroad in front of the locomotive.
The defect? The walk way safety chains that hook either between units or across the end hand rails. If the droop in the chain is more than 8 inches, it's a defect. The one in the picture was way more than 8 inches.
CMStPnP charlie hebdo Sadly on here, it's once again "blame the messenger" or inspectors. My impression as someone living near (so hearing) the UP mainline has been one of many UP locomotives needing serious engine work (less so with visiting NW ones) and many freight cars with wheels well out of true. Hearing is believing. Laying off mechanical workers in the shop (deferred or never maintenance) is a recipe for serious problems. All part of a cost-cutting, maximize short-term profits philosophy. I have to say I am becomming more and more a fan of CP management over UP managemant and am even rebalancing my stock portfolio slowly in that direction. I find the new CP marketing proposals highly innovative and aggressive. UP once upon a time used to be that way but it started to fade after they merged with SP. I think CP might end up buying some UP lines sooner or later. Pehaps even force a sale via the Feds with the argument that CP could do better and it would be for the public good.........we'll see.
charlie hebdo Sadly on here, it's once again "blame the messenger" or inspectors. My impression as someone living near (so hearing) the UP mainline has been one of many UP locomotives needing serious engine work (less so with visiting NW ones) and many freight cars with wheels well out of true. Hearing is believing. Laying off mechanical workers in the shop (deferred or never maintenance) is a recipe for serious problems. All part of a cost-cutting, maximize short-term profits philosophy.
Quite possibly. And mechanical problems are the issue, not especially FRA or other government inspections.
I got the impression that the "problem" was that the FRA conducted an inspection 'blitz', perhaps a new and unannounced inspection priority, where large numbers of people descended simultaneously looking for (and evidently finding) enough defects to severely clog operations within a very short timeframe. I can almost have sympathy for the frustration of the UP people who are now on record as asking the surfeit of inspectors to get out.
Almost, but not quite. The whole premise of FRA inspection is that there be no defects to find on inspection -- for there to be so many, in so many contexts, says to me that the FRA was aware of the deterioriating situation with UP maintenance and conducted this blitz accordingly.
OvermodI got the impression that the "problem" was that the FRA conducted an inspection 'blitz', perhaps a new and unannounced inspection priority, where large numbers of people descended simultaneously looking for (and evidently finding) enough defects to severely clog operations within a very short timeframe. I can almost have sympathy for the frustration of the UP people who are now on record as asking the surfeit of inspectors to get out. Almost, but not quite. The whole premise of FRA inspection is that there be no defects to find on inspection -- for there to be so many, in so many contexts, says to me that the FRA was aware of the deterioriating situation with UP maintenance and conducted this blitz accordingly.
FRA 'Blitz' have been happening from time to time as long as there has been the FRA. The number of 'defects' the FRA find vary. The FRA may be acting on a 'tip' from UP employees.
If UP has undertaken some 'process', the results of which end up in FRA failures the results could be staggering in disrupting operations.
BaltACD Overmod I got the impression that the "problem" was that the FRA conducted an inspection 'blitz', perhaps a new and unannounced inspection priority, where large numbers of people descended simultaneously looking for (and evidently finding) enough defects to severely clog operations within a very short timeframe. I can almost have sympathy for the frustration of the UP people who are now on record as asking the surfeit of inspectors to get out. Almost, but not quite. The whole premise of FRA inspection is that there be no defects to find on inspection -- for there to be so many, in so many contexts, says to me that the FRA was aware of the deterioriating situation with UP maintenance and conducted this blitz accordingly. FRA 'Blitz' have been happening from time to time as long as there has been the FRA. The number of 'defects' the FRA find vary. The FRA may be acting on a 'tip' from UP employees. If UP has undertaken some 'process', the results of which end up in FRA failures the results could be staggering in disrupting operations.
Overmod I got the impression that the "problem" was that the FRA conducted an inspection 'blitz', perhaps a new and unannounced inspection priority, where large numbers of people descended simultaneously looking for (and evidently finding) enough defects to severely clog operations within a very short timeframe. I can almost have sympathy for the frustration of the UP people who are now on record as asking the surfeit of inspectors to get out. Almost, but not quite. The whole premise of FRA inspection is that there be no defects to find on inspection -- for there to be so many, in so many contexts, says to me that the FRA was aware of the deterioriating situation with UP maintenance and conducted this blitz accordingly.
It's also possible to get on the FRA's radar which leads to more field inspections. Usually it's after a number of high profile accidents.
Perhaps UP has put itself on that radar. There's been some high profile accidents this year. Most on other railroads but the majority of the public don't know UP from NS. Throw in the recent furloughs of mechanical department employees, both locomotive and car, the FRA may have decided UP needs some closer scrutiny.
UP might be in the spotlight, but I'd bet the FRA could decend on any major terminal on any other class one and find similar conditions.
jeffhergert UP might be in the spotlight, but I'd bet the FRA could decend on any major terminal on any other class one and find similar conditions.
FRA said they found defects on something like 20% of all freight cars, which was "twice the national average". Let's think about the implications there.
There is no way all l those cars developed defects since the last time they were inspected. Most of those defects were already missed once before they got to Bailey Yard. Many of the cars almost certainly originated outside the UP system (interchange, short line, run-through unit trains, etc.) - so many of those effects "should have" been caught by someone before they even got to the UP.
In fact, for the FRA to find 20% defects instead of 10% defects almost seems to make it impossible that the difference was solely due to UP's practices, let alone due to UP's practices at a single yard. Even if every other place was missing only the "normal" 10% of all defects, that would imply that 10% of all cars developed defects between there and Bailey. In my own personal opinion, it sure looks like the FRA MUST have been doing something different during this inspection (i.e. they simply must have been pickier).
Further thoughts: The fact that FRA typically finds 10% when they come to visit means that somewhere around 10% of the fleet is probably running around with a condition that FRA inspectors would call a defect (if they were to do a visual inspection).
Is that a safety problem? We don't know. The question is, are the "defects" that the FRA catches on their inspections the defects that actually cause derailments and / or employee injuries? For instance, if the FRA is catching cases of insufficient side bearing clearance - which caused 143 reportable derailments in the last 15 years - then they are contributing to safety. If they are writing defects for "bent sill step", which - from the sketchy data available on the FRA's website - appears to have been implicated in maybe 1-3 injuries over the last 15 years, then maybe not so much.
Dan
(Because I am speaking about a competitor, i am required to tell you that I am a BNSF employee, the opinions above are strictly my own, and I am not representing BNSF.)
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