I think this car is missing more than an axle.
http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=2255427
"No soup for you!" - Yev Kassem (from Seinfeld)
I'd say "Yikes!" , too, since the other car's coupler wouldn't be that distorted if the blue tank weren't loaded. I'm not sure, but I think the bottom shelf of the black tank's coupler (and the truck on the end of that tank) is doing all of the work here.
(Always at war with those who think OTR [off-the-rails] trucking is easy...sorry, EdBenton!)
Carl
Railroader Emeritus (practiced railroading for 46 years--and in 2010 I finally got it right!)
CAACSCOCOM--I don't want to behave improperly, so I just won't behave at all. (SM)
Well!
Sure says a lot to the effectiveness of the 'Safety' type locking coupler system(?)
I looked at the album and found a photograph from a different angle.
http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=2255425
In the 2nd photo, you can see the 'missing' truck way off to the right, about midway along the next blue tank car, just to the right of the wood utility pole.
Note that the caption to the 2nd photo says that "This is the result of a remote control switch throwing itself under the train" ( ! ? ! ) I don't have enough experience with them to know if either that's even possible, the result of operator error (like my typing !), a protective safety circuit to prevent that - such as by detecting occupancy of the switch - didn't work - perhaps because that car was so long the trucks spanned over the circuit ? - or the switch truly just decided to act on its own, etc.
In the 1st photo, note also that the numbers of the 2 blue tank car are sequential - TILX 301732 and TILX 301733.
The shelf-coupler guys ought to be patting themselves on the back for a graphic demonstration of how good their product is, and now having another inadvertent but nevertheless great photo for the advertising guys to work with !
Thanks for sharing.
- Paul North.
I was going to suggest a failed metal theft incident, given recent news items.
I tend to doubt the story there, since the remote-control circuitry is generally designed to be fail-safe, and the circuits are designed to handle the longest possible distance between axles, which is, I think, about 65 feet. The total length of the blue tank car is 68'10", so I'm guessing that the distance between close axles of the trucks would be 55 feet, at most.
More likely, a wheel on the errant truck picked the point, probably due to a thin flange.
"Geez, now where'd I leave that truck? It MUST be around here someplace...."
Well, basically, that's why I'm not into model trains.
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well i'll be...that's one way to transport a bad order!
first i find my car up on blocks now this......
Perhaps the switch had been placed on hand-throw operation, of which a key step is lining the switch over and lining it back for movement after taking the switch off power and placing it in hand-throw operation. Failure to do this can cause the switch to "float", creating a gap in the points and leading to potential derailments.
I certainly don't know what happened here, points could have been picked, too.
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