PigFarmer1 i Even though I'm not on the transportation side I do occassionally work with those guys. I respectfully disagree with your position that the fatigue problem has not become serious enough. I would opine that the problem is serious but, as usual, the carriers simply choose to turn a blind eye to the issue. I had a trainman I worked with tell me that almost every guy (Including himself) on his territory was on some kind of presciption drug to help keep them awake. The human body simply isn't designed to operate under the conditions that trainmen operate.
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Even though I'm not on the transportation side I do occassionally work with those guys. I respectfully disagree with your position that the fatigue problem has not become serious enough. I would opine that the problem is serious but, as usual, the carriers simply choose to turn a blind eye to the issue. I had a trainman I worked with tell me that almost every guy (Including himself) on his territory was on some kind of presciption drug to help keep them awake. The human body simply isn't designed to operate under the conditions that trainmen operate.
Yes it is a serious problem. And management is deeply concerned. They have to be able to determine the number of crews and their locations vs the number of trains and routing. Then there is the safety of all...it is cheaper to run a train safely than to have a wreck to clean up and a line closed for a day or more. Carriers do are not turning a blind eye but working with unions and government agencies to come up with a solution...and the fact is that there is no one solution for all the operations. There are so many variables to freight schedules and so many variables to crews needs and desires. Safety may be on the side of 12 hours off with 8 hours sleep prior to return to service. But that 12 hours could stretch to 24, so where should the 8 hour sleep be and who can tell? Or, the end of a run is 4-7 hours and the crew would rather turn around and go home than spend 12 hours off the clock away from home. Which is best for the crew? the railroad? safety? There are no simple one size fits all answers.
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petitnj Unfortunately , the fatigue problem has not become serious enough and so difficult to prove in accidents, that it will not be seriously addressed by the railroads, unions or the FRA. Unfortunately, the FRA will eventually come down with some edict that will cost the railroads $billions and then they will scream and shout.
Unfortunately , the fatigue problem has not become serious enough and so difficult to prove in accidents, that it will not be seriously addressed by the railroads, unions or the FRA. Unfortunately, the FRA will eventually come down with some edict that will cost the railroads $billions and then they will scream and shout.
The problem was perhaps not taken too seriously when it first was identified, but now that it has been studied further, the problem has definitely been found to be serious enough to take action.
Look at how the problem is defined: Loss of consciousness can occur any time on duty by the sudden, unforeseeable onset of overpowering fatigue due to a disease caused by working nights. That is a serious problem.
And action is being taken on the problem, and it won’t matter whether the railroads want to go along with it or not. Action will simply be imposed on the railroads by regulation.
Assigned crews with set report times is bandied about often but just as often is impractical. OK for passenger schedules and yard and local turns but gets out of hand with longer distance freights. One mishap, slow order, one missed connection or delay can throw the scheduled crew time off by hours, even a full day. It has been tried and applied, but is found to be very difficult to adhere to and administer. You could be assigned an on duty time, but if there is no train to run, you sit doing nothing...then, after four hours a train arrives and you go out on an 8-10 run and what have you gained? You could be assigned a train on a daily or every other day basis...but what if the 8AM arrival is delayed to noon or 3PM or 8PM...what have you accomplished...you may have actually lost a days wages. There is no simple answer to the problem, no simple solutions.
It's all about profit and production. The corporate line about safety sounds great but when it comes right down to it the almighty dollar is what is most important.
It is a serious problem if they are all taking drugs to stay awake. I meant that it is not perceived as serious enough by the railroads to take action. You would think that piling 5 multimillion dollar locos into each other every few months would force them to take action!
Greyhound's idea is outstanding. And yes, regular scheduling of trains would solve some of these problems. Unfortunately , the fatigue problem has not become serious enough and so difficult to prove in accidents, that it will not be seriously addressed by the railroads, unions or the FRA. Unfortunately, the FRA will eventually come down with some edict that will cost the railroads $billions and then they will scream and shout.
greyhounds Every time I suggest this I get cussed out. Keep the crews with the train working regular hours. If it works in Austrailia it will work in the US. The eastbound train was a LA-Chciago run. Put passenger accomodations on it for the crew. Total crew leaving LA would be 10. 4 engineers, 4 conductors, one mechanic and one cook. E&C work regular six hour shifts. Then they are off for 18 hours. Regular body 24 hour sleep cycle is maintained. Mechanic is "On Call" and has commonly needed parts and tools available. Cook prepares meals and coffee as required. (Crews may have to heat meals in microwave at times. Who among us doesn't do that?) Crew accomodations have nice private rooms with internet, cell phone access, satelite TV and private refrigerator. Crews work regular schedule, with seven days on and three days off. Away from home crews at days off time get flown home. Crews could plan their lives and promise their wife/daughter/son to attend party/little league game on scheduled days off. Railroad company wins becuase it doesn't have to pay taxis, crew transport companies, hotels, or worry about matching crews to trains. And the trains keep moving. If a towboat pilot can learn the Mississipi River from St. Paul to New Orleans a rail crew can learn the UP from LA to Chicago. Let the cursing begin.
Every time I suggest this I get cussed out. Keep the crews with the train working regular hours. If it works in Austrailia it will work in the US.
The eastbound train was a LA-Chciago run. Put passenger accomodations on it for the crew. Total crew leaving LA would be 10. 4 engineers, 4 conductors, one mechanic and one cook. E&C work regular six hour shifts. Then they are off for 18 hours. Regular body 24 hour sleep cycle is maintained. Mechanic is "On Call" and has commonly needed parts and tools available. Cook prepares meals and coffee as required. (Crews may have to heat meals in microwave at times. Who among us doesn't do that?)
Crew accomodations have nice private rooms with internet, cell phone access, satelite TV and private refrigerator. Crews work regular schedule, with seven days on and three days off. Away from home crews at days off time get flown home. Crews could plan their lives and promise their wife/daughter/son to attend party/little league game on scheduled days off.
Railroad company wins becuase it doesn't have to pay taxis, crew transport companies, hotels, or worry about matching crews to trains. And the trains keep moving.
If a towboat pilot can learn the Mississipi River from St. Paul to New Orleans a rail crew can learn the UP from LA to Chicago.
Let the cursing begin.
greyhounds:
I don't see how your suggestion would elicit the argument you predict?
Seem to be a pretty rational suggestion to a real problem and would be one way to handle the issue of re-crews on some long distance moves. It would seem to be a partial idea for the railraods to handle some expense issues, as well. I would let the the folks who post around here and earn their livings of the railroads express their feelings about this way to handle a sticky situation.
I used to travel between Memphis,Tn and Decatur, Al and many times observed an NS practice (of those times) where an Eastbound NS train would meet a westbound train (at about the Courtland, Al area (where there was a long passing siding.) They would swap trains and then continue on. I was told that it was a practice that allowed each crew to run their miles and hours and be at home at the ends of their shifts. That as well seems to be another way to handle some of the issues for train crews and get them home on a regular basis while managing their time to the benefit of most. .
jeffhergert diningcar: It was mid-morning and the EB crew had just come on duty 75 + - west from the site. If this was their home terminal they should have been well rested. From postings on another site by railroaders in that area. The eastbound crew came on duty at 0640 at Dalhart TX, there home terminal. I'm going to guess that they received the normal 90 minute call, receiving notification at 0510. The train departed at 0845 with the collision happening around 10am. One of the crewmen's (I think condr) last job before this trip, had tied up on a deadhead at 1305 on 6/21. If the date is correct, he had a few days off. Even if he had tied up the day before at 1305, you would think he would've had a good night's sleep. {snip} Jeff
diningcar: It was mid-morning and the EB crew had just come on duty 75 + - west from the site. If this was their home terminal they should have been well rested.
It was mid-morning and the EB crew had just come on duty 75 + - west from the site. If this was their home terminal they should have been well rested.
From postings on another site by railroaders in that area. The eastbound crew came on duty at 0640 at Dalhart TX, there home terminal. I'm going to guess that they received the normal 90 minute call, receiving notification at 0510. The train departed at 0845 with the collision happening around 10am. One of the crewmen's (I think condr) last job before this trip, had tied up on a deadhead at 1305 on 6/21. If the date is correct, he had a few days off. Even if he had tied up the day before at 1305, you would think he would've had a good night's sleep.
{snip}
Jeff
Even if you were off for 100 hours doesn't mean that you had a good sleep for the 6, 8, 10, or whatver hours prior to being called for work. Maybe you got a good 8 hours sleep 18 hours prior to being called, or maybe you suffered from a rare (for you) insomnia for the 10 hours just prior to being called. Being off for some required number of hours does not necessarily mean you ended your full quota of rest when you were called for work.
Semper Vaporo
Pkgs.
mudchicken FlaCat: Semper Vaporo: Maybe what is needed is for the alerter to be a multi-postion switch that must be moved to some random position specified by a display .....Even with only one crew member, he would have to walk to the other side of the cab to read the position to set the switch for his own side. He'd read on the right side to set the left side to "1" and go to the left side, set the switch to '1' and read to set the right side to "4" and return to the right side to set it to "4". Repeat this every couple of minutes? .... Kind of a giant Skinner box? Fine ... and in the meantime miss the form B board or broken rail or something that might have otherwise caught your eye.
FlaCat: Semper Vaporo: Maybe what is needed is for the alerter to be a multi-postion switch that must be moved to some random position specified by a display .....Even with only one crew member, he would have to walk to the other side of the cab to read the position to set the switch for his own side. He'd read on the right side to set the left side to "1" and go to the left side, set the switch to '1' and read to set the right side to "4" and return to the right side to set it to "4". Repeat this every couple of minutes? .... Kind of a giant Skinner box?
Semper Vaporo: Maybe what is needed is for the alerter to be a multi-postion switch that must be moved to some random position specified by a display .....Even with only one crew member, he would have to walk to the other side of the cab to read the position to set the switch for his own side. He'd read on the right side to set the left side to "1" and go to the left side, set the switch to '1' and read to set the right side to "4" and return to the right side to set it to "4". Repeat this every couple of minutes? ....
Maybe what is needed is for the alerter to be a multi-postion switch that must be moved to some random position specified by a display .....Even with only one crew member, he would have to walk to the other side of the cab to read the position to set the switch for his own side. He'd read on the right side to set the left side to "1" and go to the left side, set the switch to '1' and read to set the right side to "4" and return to the right side to set it to "4". Repeat this every couple of minutes? ....
Kind of a giant Skinner box?
Fine ... and in the meantime miss the form B board or broken rail or something that might have otherwise caught your eye.
WHAT? Ya means he has something better to do than running around the cab copying numbers from one place to another?
Sorry, just being silly. I know that until there are vaporizing lasers on the head end to remove obstructions and total control of the train movement by all knowing computer systems, the engineer needs to be alert to what is ahead (as well as what is behind on the drawbar). I was just "blue skying" about how to keep the engineer from resetting the Alerter by rote. Some method of eliminating the repetitiveness of the present system.
If the Engineer and Conductor often call out the aspect of approaching signals and such, and I figured that when the Alerter starts beeping, the Engineer could glance at his display and call out the number and the conductor would do likewise and they both set their respective Alerter dial to what the other called out. This would not take much more effort than glancing at the speedometer to see the speed or glancing over the other meters and displays to ensure proper operation and thus not be that much more distracting than what is presently done, but introduce some randomness to the system to eliminate (or reduce) the ability to do it while asleep.
Then I thought about those possible times when there is only one person in the cab and how to keep him from getting complacent about the Alerter... and my "blue sky" gots some dust clouds in it.
(And then this lil' birdie flew over and I was again reminded that I should keep my mouth shut when I get to looking up at the blue sky! )
Uh Oh. I see another fanatical campaign by Bucyrus here. Never mind the fact that the AC is 20 ft ahead of the exhaust and the exhaust was being left behind at 67MPH or more, We'll blame it on the AC.
Jeff,
You bring up some very interesting thoughts. I have no idea how those AC systems are designed, but I know I find a lot of issues with commercial AC intallations. I wonder how much CO is produced by the locomotives. As I understand, the outdoor temperature was very high at the time of the collision, so AC would have been much needed.
diningcar It was mid-morning and the EB crew had just come on duty 75 + - west from the site. If this was their home terminal they should have been well rested.
I don't know if it both held turns in their pools or were extra board covering vacancies. (If one had a couple days off, I would think he held the pool. Of course sometimes, the extra board turns slower than the pool.) Sometimes, you can turn faster out of your home terminal. I remember a time working the extra board when we were short handed, we were turning on our rest (called in 6 1/2 to be back after 8 off) at home, but getting about 16+ hours off in the motel. No matter which end your on, line-ups of expected jobs can cause you to get caught short. That's one of the biggest complaints of those of us working irregular assignments. This morning I went to work 2 hours earlier than I expected according to what the line-up showed when I went to bed, and for the 6 hours before that.
I wonder, putting aside rest issues or sleep disorders, has there ever been studies done on exhaust/carbon monoxide building up in the modern cabs? Most of the times the windows are closed, relying on AC/heaters to keep temperature levels comfortable. (While I like running with the windows open during mild weather, there's nothing worse on a very hot/humid day to see a train pull up with the windows open. It means the AC doesn't work.) There supposed to be better insulated than the old cabs, but that can also mean less fresh air inside. There are ways to bring in outside air, but I'm not sure where the intakes are. Possibly those intakes could, at least under certain circumstances, draw in exhaust. That could explain a lot in some of these collisions where both crewmembers seemingly went to sleep.
Or maybe not. It's not unheard of for both crewmembers to have dozed off without help from outside sources. It also would be in a lot of parties' interest to lay all the blame on those who can no longer defend themselves.
The news has often had stories about the problems of people falling asleep on the job (aircraft controllers, pilots, engineers, etc.), but I never saw any suggestions on how that could be avoided.
Back in the late forties, when I was working interlockers, I had no trouble staying awake on 3rd trick (11 pm - 7 AM) , but trying to stay awake on 2nd trick (3pm - 11 pm) was a big problem; the body wanted to go to sleep at 10 pm no matter what. (This had probably been drilled into me by my mother.)
But an old timer showed me a simple way to keep awake. His method was to take a heavy object like a wrench, loop a cord through it and then loop the cord around your wrist. Hold the wrench in your hand, and should you fall asleep, your hand relaxes the grip, the wrench falls, and jerks you awake. Repeat, as needed, and works best with a tall stool.
Naturally, the cord and its length is critical; it must not break and the wrench must not hit the floor. I never had trouble staying awake from then on.
Admittedly, the following linked article is dated the 25th of June but it may contain some relevant information.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=155716424
Posted from NPR:
by The Associated Press
FTL:"...The National Transportation Safety Board determined that one of the trains failed to take a side track and give the other locomotive the right of way, NTSB spokesman Mark Rosekind said Monday night. He declined to say which train was on the wrong track, but said no malfunction was found in the signals that guide the trains..."
FlaCat Semper Vaporo: Maybe what is needed is for the alerter to be a multi-postion switch that must be moved to some random position specified by a display .....Even with only one crew member, he would have to walk to the other side of the cab to read the position to set the switch for his own side. He'd read on the right side to set the left side to "1" and go to the left side, set the switch to '1' and read to set the right side to "4" and return to the right side to set it to "4". Repeat this every couple of minutes? .... Kind of a giant Skinner box?
And the investigation will tell us how long they were off. so we shall wait.
Define "well rested". I mean the could have been off duty a legal 12 hours before getting the call or they could have been off 24 or 40 hours without a call. Did they a fifful suggested 8 hours rest before signing in? Or were they up for the last 8 hours because they had slept 8 or 10 hours. Well rested is a fine phrase but undefined. Legally, it is being off duty the prescribed amount of time; practically, it could mean nothing.
Just a comment. One of the reasons, I suspect, people text message on the road is simple boredom. I would speculate that when you have a 2 person crew at least you have someone to talk to.
As an example in the Chatsworth wreck the Metrolink engineer was in the cab by himself and got bored and got in the bad habit of text messaging to pass the time.
Rgds IGN
Any railroader knows that NTSB and the carrier will look into cell phone use right off the bat. Like it or not we all know that even though we have rules prohibiting the use of electronic devices said devices are routinely used. That use goes from the top of the corporate food chain all the way to the bottom. I hope for the sake of the families that the guys involved were not using their phones.
Semper Vaporo Maybe what is needed is for the alerter to be a multi-postion switch that must be moved to some random position specified by a display .....Even with only one crew member, he would have to walk to the other side of the cab to read the position to set the switch for his own side. He'd read on the right side to set the left side to "1" and go to the left side, set the switch to '1' and read to set the right side to "4" and return to the right side to set it to "4". Repeat this every couple of minutes? ....
Thanks Lion. That is exactly what I was looking for. It is interesting that the control can distinguish dying from sleeping.
Bucyrus Yes, I understand that the dead man pedal can be defeated by jamming or weighting, but I am wondering if it can be held down with your feet while sleeping. I suppose that might be possible, but I don’t know. I guess I would have to research dead man pedal technology. But my point was to compare the dead man pedal to the alerter with both being used as intended. However, even if you defeat the dead man pedal with jamming or weighting, you know you are on your own if you fall asleep. But the alterter provides a false sense of security. A person believes that he is fine if he is able to reset the alerter. And yet it is possible to run several miles resetting the alterter while being so near full sleep that you miss signals, and eventually run into another train. So, I conclude that unless it is easy to sleep while holding down the dead man pedal, the alerter is less reliable than the dead man pedal in preventing sleep accidents.
But my point was to compare the dead man pedal to the alerter with both being used as intended. However, even if you defeat the dead man pedal with jamming or weighting, you know you are on your own if you fall asleep. But the alterter provides a false sense of security. A person believes that he is fine if he is able to reset the alerter. And yet it is possible to run several miles resetting the alterter while being so near full sleep that you miss signals, and eventually run into another train. So, I conclude that unless it is easy to sleep while holding down the dead man pedal, the alerter is less reliable than the dead man pedal in preventing sleep accidents.
A dead man's control will not stop a train if the engineer falls asleep. You can sleep all night long with your foot on the dead man's or with your hands on the controller on your subway train. If you die then your muscles will relax, you will fall off the chair, and you will release the dead man, otherwise, not.
ROAR
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Here there be cats. LIONS with CAMERAS
Alerter technology appears to be evolving away from simple time-and-reset like a snooze alarm, and toward directly monitoring the crew person to see if they are fatigued and tending to fall asleep. Not only would this stop the train so the person could be taken out of service, but it would single out persons needing sleep disorder diagnosis and treatment.
Yes, I understand that the dead man pedal can be defeated by jamming or weighting, but I am wondering if it can be held down with your feet while sleeping. I suppose that might be possible, but I don’t know. I guess I would have to research dead man pedal technology.
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