The AAR has issued recommendations intended to address the problem without essentailly any new technoloogy or application of different technology. These recommendations, which are certain to be implemented by the seven Class I's and probably by most regionals and those shortlines with massive oil traffic, include more detectors, more track inspection, and generally increased vigilence.
I wish to suggest one revival of an old practice, car knockers. Walking each side of a loaded oil train and tapping each wheel with a small hammer, and listening to the "bonk". (it is not a clea-as-a-bell bong, but there is a tone along with the thud, thus bonk not bong.) Any wheel starting to develop a crack or fissure will sound different. In the days of iron wheels this was standard proceedure. I think it should be revived for oil trains and other hazmat trains.
I recall reading about the era of silk trains and how their extreme value necessitated the highest priority handling of all time. It was said that they would spike the switches ahead of silk trains. I have also heard of spiking the switches ahead of trains carrying exceptionally important people.
That always struck me as a surprising practice. I can understand how it would add safety, but it seems so extreme for the amount of safety it would add that I get the impression it was more symbolic than practical.
Not impractical if you cannot have each switch manned at the time of passage. Silk was a highly valued and time sensitive product, for instance, and had to be delivered so that at the precise time the silk was ready from the cocoons. Millions of dollars were at stake. Special volatile cargoes, dangerous materials like nuclear waste or weapons, special moves, all demand extra safety precautions. The only "important" people I recall getting this special safety protection are POTUS trains, Presidential candidates' trains and the Royal Family of England's trains.
RIDEWITHMEHENRY is the name for our almost monthly day of riding trains and transit in either the NYCity or Philadelphia areas including all commuter lines, Amtrak, subways, light rail and trolleys, bus and ferries when warranted. No fees, just let us know you want to join the ride and pay your fares. Ask to be on our email list or find us on FB as RIDEWITHMEHENRY (all caps) to get descriptions of each outing.
Here is a link to a scholarly article (UIUC Rail Transportation and Engineering Center) that analyzes the causes of derailment in US over a 10-year period:
http://ict.illinois.edu/railroad/CEE/pdf/Journal%20Papers/2012/Liu%20et%20al%202012.pdf
Broken rail and track geometry defects are the #1 and #2 causes.
And an earlier article from UIUC:
http://ict.illinois.edu/railroad/CEE/pdf/Conference%20Proceedings/2005/Anderson%20and%20Barkan%202005.pdf
C&NW, CA&E, MILW, CGW and IC fan
daveklepper I wish to suggest one revival of an old practice, car knockers. Walking each side of a loaded oil train and tapping each wheel with a small hammer, and listening to the "bonk". (it is not a clea-as-a-bell bong, but there is a tone along with the thud, thus bonk not bong.)
I wish to suggest one revival of an old practice, car knockers. Walking each side of a loaded oil train and tapping each wheel with a small hammer, and listening to the "bonk". (it is not a clea-as-a-bell bong, but there is a tone along with the thud, thus bonk not bong.)
Use the electronic broken wheel detectors that test every wheel of every train automatically and don't rely on human interpretation. They test 24x7 while the train is moving, no delay and provide a record of which wheels were tested when and any exceptions.
Why go back to 1800's technology when there is better technology being used now (and has been in use for decades).
Dave H. Painted side goes up. My website : wnbranch.com
Euclid I recall reading about the era of silk trains and how their extreme value necessitated the highest priority handling of all time. It was said that they would spike the switches ahead of silk trains. I have also heard of spiking the switches ahead of trains carrying exceptionally important people. That always struck me as a surprising practice. I can understand how it would add safety, but it seems so extreme for the amount of safety it would add that I get the impression it was more symbolic than practical.
I believe you will find that the silk-train fol-de-rol was mostly theater.
Spiking switches, special crossing guards, incredible speed through the night with terribly perishable, terribly high-value cargo -- the stuff of which public-relations bonanzas are built.
That stuff is indeed so extreme for the amount of added safety that it is more symbolic than practical. And much more geared toward romanticism than safety...
And no, none of that perception will apply to Bakken-crude trains: the stuff is little better than a commodity, devoid of any particular romance I can conceive of, being moved for the mere convenience of overcharging petroleum plutocrats, that might derail and explode readily (or so the media will say, in between gleefully reporting murders and making an inch and a half of snow into an icy Armageddon). Making a big thing out of how safe you HAVE to make your railroad in order to avoid flaming disasters seems ... counterproductive, to me. Any attempt to call attention to heroic or 'special' oil-train safety measures might be counterproductive, certainly to the extent it opens up consideration of all those mystical tank cars of deathyl ethyl awful diisocyanate and such that currently roll by relatively innocently.
Silk was an extremely high value commodity as well as extremely perishable thus useless and without value if not delivered on time. Bakken crude, or any other crude, does not have the super high value nor is perishable.
While it is true that oil trains are not high value like silk trains were, they do share a mutual connection to the need for extra safety. For the silk trains, that need was based on the value of the load, and the speed and priority of the train. For oil trains the need for extra safety is based, not on the value of the load, but on their ability to destroy a town.
So I think both types of trains are related to that common feature of needing extra safety. Whether these concerns are based on reality or not seems to make no difference. Calling for spiking the switches for one train to pass does seem largely symbolic, as I mentioned. But then so too does the AAR call for oil carriers to include more detectors, more track inspection, and generally increased vigilance.
But if the exploding oil train problem itself is largely symbolic, then maybe fighting it symbolically is the strongest tactic. That is what I call the marketing aspect of the fireball solution. If the fireball problem is largely symbolic, the best remedy would be to let it dissipate over time. But the risk to that strategy is that one more high profile fireball, and the problem is back stronger than ever.
Well, what is the value of safety? We all talk about it, railroads talk about it and teach it and advertise it. But what is it, what does it do? And despite how much common sense there is to it, it actually took unions to make railroads apply it. Of course we all can raise our hands about injuries and death being preventable by safety. But also, as the railroads found out, it is cheaper than not being able to run trains, give service. And the costs repairing or losing equipment. It avoids litigation costs and payouts from accidents. It avoids poor public images. No matter how small a stumble or huge an explosion, there are so many avoidable costs if there is a strong and conscientious effort for safety.
I guess opinions are the stuff of these forums, some well-grounded, and others off the top of the head. Empirical studies are ignored because facts are inconvenient. The first study posted made it quite clear that the #1 & 2 causes of derailments are broken rail joints and poor track geometry, both correctable without reinventing equipment.
Car inspectors do walk each outbound train, but I don't think they they ring the wheels these days. I suspect it has more to do with the nature of wheel defects. I don't think current wheels fail the way the old wrought wheels used to.
The big hitter these days is handbrakes left on. Some places do outbound roll-bys as well as the regular car inspection to try to eliminate this.
-Don (Random stuff, mostly about trains - what else? http://blerfblog.blogspot.com/)
schlimm I guess opinions are the stuff of these forums, some well-grounded, and others off the top of the head. Empirical studies are ignored because facts are inconvenient. The first study posted made it quite clear that the #1 & 2 causes of derailments are broken rail joints and poor track geometry, both correctable without reinventing equipment.
You're right, schlimm, this did start out about track problems being the cause. I wonder if railroads believe that if track is circuited for signals a broken rail or joint disrupts the signal and thus will automatically show stop or restrictions. However, that is not always the case as there may be a crack or fault which does not create a break or big enough break of the circuit. Thus, the old standby is what is lacking: a walking track inspector. Back when they walked five miles one way and five miles back in a given day. Today, even two men in a truck cannot spot the tiniest of problems. But is there a government agency or a ton of common sense anyplace that would bring back the track walker today?
Who is ignoring empirical studies or finding facts to be inconvenient?
Whether a derailment is caused by track problems or train problems, modifying the train to mitigate the derailment damage still makes sense. Safety needs all the backup and redundancy precautions that it can get. Broken rails or welds are indeed correctable or avoidable problems, but obviously, that is not being accomplished in many cases.
Why walk it when the HiRail is so much faster and better?
23 17 46 11
How fast can you see? How close a look a a crack can you view even at 5mph?
henry6 Thus, the old standby is what is lacking: a walking track inspector. Back when they walked five miles one way and five miles back in a given day. Today, even two men in a truck cannot spot the tiniest of problems. But is there a government agency or a ton of common sense anyplace that would bring back the track walker today?
Thus, the old standby is what is lacking: a walking track inspector. Back when they walked five miles one way and five miles back in a given day. Today, even two men in a truck cannot spot the tiniest of problems. But is there a government agency or a ton of common sense anyplace that would bring back the track walker today?
henry6 How fast can you see? How close a look a a crack can you view even at 5mph?
Thanks to Chris / CopCarSS for my avatar.
A lot of the HiRails have video cameras that record the track, and some have a sensor, not sure if it is electromagnetic or ultra-sonic to detect defects….add in a really experienced track inspector and you have great quality control.
BNSF HiRails the section of main line that runs by my house daily….from Pierce Yard(east Houston) to Tomball,(northwest Harris County) out and back in, around a 40 mile run both ways.
You are talking about bringing back some part of a section gang…and trust me, hiring a guy to walk an eight to ten mile section daily would mean hiring a few thousand guys per carrier.
Car knockers…read Carmen, and yes, they do inspect wheels, every car that enters a yard be it on a unit train or loose car gets looked over very closely, you would be startled at how many wheel sets get condemned daily, if I remember correctly, Baily Yard does 90 plus wheel set replacements a day.
I can’t think of a single day my little road doesn’t change wheel sets out, we have a whole parking lot full of new wheels just for that reason.
[from 2nd article]
The probability of derailment for a single train is largely a function of track class, distance traveled, and train length. While a shorter train will have a lower probability of derailment, shipments of longer trains will have a lower probability that one or more trains will be derailed (for a fixed quantity of cars shipped). The probability that a particular car will be derailed in a derailment is largely a function of train length, train speed, and positioning within the consist. More cars can be expected to derail with increases in train speed and residual train length. Cars positioned near the front or rear of a train have the lowest probability of being derailed in a derailment. As train length is decreased or train speed is increased, the conditional probability of derailment increases for all cars within the train consist.
[from 1st article]
Analysis of the causes of train accidents is critical for rational allocation of resources to reduce accident occurrence in the most cost-effective manner possible. Train derailment data from the FRA rail equipment accident database for the interval 2001 to 2010 were analyzed for each track type, with accounting for frequency of occurrence by cause and number of cars derailed. Statistical analyses were conducted to examine the effects of accident cause, type of track, and derailment speed. The analysis showed that broken rails or welds were the leading derailment cause on main, yard, and siding tracks [taken together]. By contrast to accident causes on main tracks, bearing failures and broken wheels were not among the top accident causes on yard or siding tracks. Instead, human factor–related causes such as improper use of switches and violation of switching rules were more prevalent. In all speed ranges, broken rails or welds were the leading cause of derailments; however, the relative frequency of the next most common accident types differed substantially for lower- versus higher-speed derailments. In general, at derailment speeds below 10 mph, certain track and human factor causes—such as improper train handling, braking operations, and improper use of switches—dominated. At derailment speeds above 25 mph, those causes were nearly absent and were replaced by equipment causes, such as bearing failure, broken wheel, and axle and journal defect
And from Mark Twain -
We have Lies, Damned Lies and Statistics.
Never too old to have a happy childhood!
BaltACD And from Mark Twain - We have Lies, Damned Lies and Statistics.
"The approach taken in this research is to conduct detailed analysis of the train accident data supplied by the railroads to FRA of the U.S. Department of Transportation." using "the Railroad Accident/Incident Reporting System (RAIRS) database."
You denigrate statistics, so maybe you'd prefer intuition or the seat of the pants approach?
And did they bother to include in their report that the number of such incidents has decreased continually for the last decade?
Why not read it for yourself? You seem to assume the report is critical. It is simply attempting to dig beneath mere aggregate data by breaking down and analyzing.
An evaluation worth reading from Progrressive Railroading:
— by Toby Kolstad
On Nov. 14, 2013, the Association of American Railroads (AAR) shocked the rail-car industry with a request to the U.S. Department of Transportation (USDOT) that it require all tank cars used to transport flammable liquids to meet certain design standards, including: full height head shields, high-pressure relief valves and thermal protection with an outer steel jacket. The AAR's response to the recent derailments involving crude oil from the Bakken Shale seemed to be "it was not our fault." The focus of the rail-car industry has remained fixed on this announcement ever since.
The Railway Supply Institute (RSI) weighed in with its own letter to the USDOT on Dec. 5, 2013, agreeing with most of AAR's suggestions with one notable exception: the required thermal protection and outer steel jacket. Moreover, the RSI suggested a 10-year grace period to allow owners of existing cars to retrofit their fleets to meet new design standards for new cars (except for the insulation and steel jacket), explaining that the retirements caused by a shorter deadline and the congestion in repair shops for cars to be refitted would result in severe car shortages.
This is not the first dust-up between the RSI and the AAR over tank car standards. After a particularly deadly derailment in 2005 involving chlorine gas (Graniteville), the AAR suggested that all tank cars moving toxic inhalation (TIH) gases built before 1989, when normalized steel was required for tank car shells, be retired within five years. Eventually, the USDOT issued regulations allowing existing TIH cars to continue in service until 2018, which will be around the 30th anniversary of the youngest cars in that group. Also, railroads and the rail-car industry agreed to intensify their efforts to improve tank-car safety, and agreed in 2011 on enhanced design standards for tank cars transporting flammable liquids. Now, the AAR wants to scrap those standards and impose new ones, even though the RSI claims that none of the consequential damage from the recent derailments involving tank cars would have been affected by the new rules.
Unlike the TIH matter that ultimately involved only 7,000 cars that had to be retired by 2018, the current problem involves tens of thousands of rail cars — estimated by various sources to be to be between 50,000 and 92,000 cars — that would cost from $30,000 to $67,000 each to modify. Consider just one car group: the 35,000 tank cars built between 2004 and 2008 to handle the ethanol that the government mandated to be mixed into the nation's gasoline supply. None of the cars have thermal jackets or high-pressure relief valves, so a minimal retrofit would cost at least $50,000 — provided all the cars could be insulated and jacketed, and still meet the AAR clearance limits. The leasing industry invested more than $3 billion to construct this fleet, and lease rates were based on a 30-year payback. Now, lessors are being asked to invest another $2 billion just to keep their cars in service, little of which could be recouped through higher lease rates because new cars costing much less eventually would be offered to lessees at much lower rates. Such are the perils of investing in freight cars!
There is one common denominator to all the tank-car derailment tragedies of late that has hardly been mentioned: Train speeds all exceeded 40 mph. High-speed derailments almost always involve dozens of cars piled into a very small space; in derailments at slower speeds, cars tend to stay coupled together and upright. Limiting the speed of trains with blocks of haz-mat tank cars to 25 mph would reduce the catastrophic consequences of derailments involving these cars by almost 100 percent. That would be far more effective than the 56.6 percent reduction estimated by the AAR's own research for the tank-car changes they have suggested, or the 37 percent reduction that would be achieved with RSI's recommendations. However, a 25 mph speed limit is as impractical to railroads as insulating and jacketing all existing tank cars in haz-mat service is for rail-car lessors.
Railroads and car owners have a lot to lose if a solution that's acceptable to both cannot be found. The RSI proposal would be a good starting point for a compromise, if timing were the only disagreement.
Toby Kolstad has been in the railroad industry for more than 40 years, with stints at the Illinois Central Gulf Railroad, Denver & Rio Grande Western Railroad, a car builder and lessor. Currently a consultant on rail-car matters and president of Rail Theory Forecasts L.L.C., he can be emailed at Tkolstad@aol.com.
schlimm BaltACD And from Mark Twain - We have Lies, Damned Lies and Statistics. Those reports used FRA statistics. "The approach taken in this research is to conduct detailed analysis of the train accident data supplied by the railroads to FRA of the U.S. Department of Transportation." using "the Railroad Accident/Incident Reporting System (RAIRS) database." You denigrate statistics, so maybe you'd prefer intuition or the seat of the pants approach?
When you have politics being involved with numbers - you have deceit. If there is a political point to be 'proven' and good use of 'the numbers' can do it. The FRA is still a political animal.
daveklepper (quoting Toby Kolstad)The leasing industry invested more than $3 billion to construct this fleet, and lease rates were based on a 30-year payback. Now, lessors are being asked to invest another $2 billion just to keep their cars in service, little of which could be recouped through higher lease rates because new cars costing much less eventually would be offered to lessees at much lower rates.
If ever there were a project that would show benefit from the Obama administration's version of 'stimulus' funding, this would be it. National welfare aspects at stake; short timeframe and 'crash' program with irrecoverable costs needed; near-zero long-term payback and little alternative economic utility.
I note Warren Buffett's thinly-veiled use of the private capital and resources available to him in developing a parallel approach to this issue. Hopefully we will see a proper Government-level program that will address the issues here, and treat the stakeholders fairly (as a proper Government-level program should).
BaltACD schlimm BaltACD And from Mark Twain - We have Lies, Damned Lies and Statistics. Those reports used FRA statistics. "The approach taken in this research is to conduct detailed analysis of the train accident data supplied by the railroads to FRA of the U.S. Department of Transportation." using "the Railroad Accident/Incident Reporting System (RAIRS) database." You denigrate statistics, so maybe you'd prefer intuition or the seat of the pants approach? When you have politics being involved with numbers - you have deceit. If there is a political point to be 'proven' and good use of 'the numbers' can do it. The FRA is still a political animal.
Are you saying the data the FRA collects from the carriers is distorted/deceitful? Or that the authors are distorting it, all for some unspecified political agenda? That sort of talk, without any evidence, is an example of operating with a siege mentality. The underlying and unvoiced assumption seems to be that "political" forces out there are conspiring against you and/or the railroads.
BaltACD schlimm BaltACD And from Mark Twain - We have Lies, Damned Lies and Statistics. Those reports used FRA statistics. "The approach taken in this research is to conduct detailed analysis of the train accident data supplied by the railroads to FRA of the U.S. Department of Transportation." using "the Railroad Accident/Incident Reporting System (RAIRS) database." You denigrate statistics, so maybe you'd prefer intuition or the seat of the pants approach?When you have politics being involved with numbers - you have deceit. If there is a political point to be 'proven' and good use of 'the numbers' can do it. The FRA is still a political animal.
Regarding the derailment statistics, I have read them and have no reason to doubt them. However, I do not understand what point the introduction of the statistics here is intended to make. And I also do not understand why some doubt the statistics. It sounds as if there is some underlying point to the statistics that is being debated here, and yet that point is being kept secret.
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