Hazardous Cargo

[Dakguy201]

Murphy Siding

    I rode with a coworker yesterday to go pick up a vehicle. He said he doesn't have any problem with the trains that run by a half mile from our office then through the middle of the city because he knows they only carry pink rock and grain. Who knew?

 

I'm further south on that same line.  Occasionally those trains also have tankers with HazMat code 1170.  I doubt the tankers contain pink rocks, although I guess you could say that they have a grain derivative.    

[tree68]

BaltACD

Without HAZMAT in all it's forms, the things we take for granted as a part of living in this country in the 21st Century, would not exist. 

And therein lies the conundrum...

After a bunch of LP incidents a while back (Kingman, Oneonta, etc), LP has been less of an issue, it would seem.  No less dangerous in and of itself (1075 is a number etched in my brain), but I suspect handling practices and containers have been improved.

While LP is heavier than air and can cover a fair distance on the ground, a major danger with a BLEVE is the projectiles.  Half an LP railroad car rocketing through the air for over a half mile is not something to ignore.

I read an account of a firefighter caught inside a BLEVE at a fixed site.  He said it was pretty spectacular, and he survived with minor, if any, injuries.  Being near the center, he was not hit with the shock wave that would have otherwise caused issues.

[traisessive1]

The bomb train SD70 Dude posted about derailed at Spy Hill, Sk in 2009. One heck of a fire it produced. Anhydrous Ammonia is another one of the chemicals on the train in large numbers. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EziYqyQ23pk

 

I don't even think about the what if's. Containers and trailers carry a lot of the weird, off the charts stuff. The good thing about that is it's not large quantities. 

[caldreamer]

The LPG or propane tank cars worry me the most.  If a car or cars catch fire the product stats to boil building up pressure.  When the car can no longer contain the pressure you get a BLEVE (boiling liquid vapor explosion).  The propane that has leaked can have traveld up to a mile or more along the ground.  When it explodes it looks like a nuclear blast.  Anything within the area is vaporized instantly.  A gasoline or oil tank explosion is childs play next to bleve.

[BaltACD]

Without HAZMAT in all it's forms, the things we take for granted as a part of living in this country in the 21st Century, would not exist. 

Chlorine - bad; without chlorine safe drinking water becomes problematical - and chlorine is just the very tip of the HAZMAT iceberg as every thing that gets transported is used in some form of process that makes everyday life in the 21st Century what it is.

[Mookie]

I am not unfamiliar with placards on tank cars (thanks Houston Ed) and since we watch them go by - at a safe distance, even with derailments (2 minor ones).  But the posters have opened up a whole new subject to keep me awake at nite, listening to the trains not far away.  Up to this point, I was worried more about our election, but this is making Halloween/the election look like a carnival.  

And yet it has to be a catch-22 - you don't inform the public constantly reminding them to be careful around trains, so as to not have hysteria but you need to get the word out that you just can't be too careful and to use your gray matter when being around any train.  

[tree68]

SD70M-2Dude

Was anyone injured or killed?

Not to my knowledge.  There were no spills, either.

[SD70M-2Dude]

tree68

SD70M-2Dude

And most everything that comes in and out of an industrial area like this goes by train...

For many years a regular traveller on CSX's Saginaw Sub in Michigan was the "Dow Death Train."  It did derail some years ago about a mile from a high school..

Was anyone injured or killed?

[Murphy Siding]

Norm48327

 

 

Murphy Siding

    I rode with a coworker yesterday to go pick up a vehicle. He said he doesn't have any problem with the trains that run by a half mile from our office then through the middle of the city because he knows they only carry pink rock and grain. Who knew?

 

 

Please tell me it wasn't YOU who hired him.

 

Oddly, railroad knowledge was not one of the interview topics.

[tree68]

SD70M-2Dude

And most everything that comes in and out of an industrial area like this goes by train...

For many years a regular traveller on CSX's Saginaw Sub in Michigan was the "Dow Death Train."  It did derail some years ago about a mile from a high school..

[SD70M-2Dude]

Everything Ed said and the non-odourized LPG/propane are my biggest fears, that stuff REALLY goes boom.  And unlike a municipal gas leak you can't smell it coming. 

CN runs a daily train from Scotford, AB (just northeast of Edmonton, near a bunch of chemical plants) to Winnipeg, MB that is composed almost entirely of all these nice things, with some other mixed freight thrown on for good measure.  Not surprisingly the crews call it the Bomb Train. 

Since I mentioned Scotford, the entire of Alberta's Industrial Heartland (East Edmonton out to the Fort Saskatchewan/Bruderheim area) is one big poison/bomb factory (literally, one plant makes weapons-grade ammonium nitrate and another's product is used in rat bait).  Multiple oil refineries populate the area, along with several fertilizer plants, Dow Chemical (vinyl chloride-type plastics & other stuff), Sherritt-Gordon's nickel refinery and loads of other chemical plants.  Funky smells always hang over the place and every now and then there are large livestock die-offs downwind (east) of the area (with the Companies denying responsibility while convieniently paying off the farmers). 

And most everything that comes in and out of an industrial area like this goes by train...

[Shadow the Cats owner]

My boss hauls Haz-mat as a carrier also.  We have a bigger issue when it comes to dealing with cars that think that placard on the side of the trailer is a target.  We had one idiot about 4 years ago drive under a fully loaded Hydrocholric acid tank.  Lucky for him his car stopped just after the hood ripped the tank open.  Sadly for him he had to stay in the car until 7500 gallons of the stuff poured onto his car. 

[edblysard]

 

Like Larry said, cyanide tops the “I don’t like this stuff” list.

 

I think that would be followed by chlorine, ammonia, and hydrogen peroxide, all innocent sounding till you realize what is in the tankcar is 100%, as opposed to the very diluted 3% in your household products…believe me, you do not want to find a chlorine leaker in your yard!

 

It will killall the weeds for ya!

 

 

 

Most of the other stuff is sorta lumped together in that we don’t want it outside the tankcar for any reason.

 

The flammable stuff, the cyanide, the TIH and PIH stuff all have different rules on how we handle them…cyanide  cars cannot be allowed to roll free, or roll against any car….it has to be shoved to a joint..

 

Flammable stuff in cuts of 2 only…there are placement in train issues with this stuff too.

 

[Norm48327]

Murphy Siding

    I rode with a coworker yesterday to go pick up a vehicle. He said he doesn't have any problem with the trains that run by a half mile from our office then through the middle of the city because he knows they only carry pink rock and grain. Who knew?

Please tell me it wasn't YOU who hired him.

[Murphy Siding]

    I rode with a coworker yesterday to go pick up a vehicle. He said he doesn't have any problem with the trains that run by a half mile from our office then through the middle of the city because he knows they only carry pink rock and grain. Who knew?

[traisessive1]

It is alarming to truly know the ignrorance of the general public. 

Dangerous commodities are not a secret. 

[rdamon]

It is much better to be standing by a red stripe beer than a tank car with a red stripe. 

[tree68]

RME

I'd be interested to hear Ed Blysard, in particular, run down the list of 'most awful' materials that he might have to deal with.  Some of them are ... more distressing than others.

Like cyanide?  Yep - it ships by rail.  

Folks around here were more concerned with the increase in speed on the line from 25 to 40 than they were with the actual cargo on the trains.  And one of those trains was nicknamed "the acid train," as it consisted mostly of chemicals.

A few years ago some folks got worried when they saw something spilling from a hopper car.  It was alumina ore - headed for the aluminum plants in Massena...

[RME]

Deggesty

Who cares about such stuff as chlorine or Methyl Ethyl Awful (Methy Ethyl Ketone)?

Well, why would you care about methyl ethyl ketone -- it was standard 'nail polish remover' for many years, and is probably about as lethal in a spill as a kitten with dirty claws.

Methyl deathyl awful is more likely to be associated with something like methyl ethyl ketone PEROXIDE (remember what Twain said about adding to words, whether the lightning is like the lightning bug, or that old song about the Presidential nature of Franklin Delano Roosevelt ... Jones.)  but, even then, it would be more an explosion hazard than a toxic-inhalation one.

I'd be interested to hear Ed Blysard, in particular, run down the list of 'most awful' materials that he might have to deal with.  Some of them are ... more distressing than others.

[NorthWest]

Exactly. Every time friends talk to me about exploding oil trains I mention that I'm a lot more worried about TIH than anything else while trackside. However, TIH doesn't have a political dimension, so...

The Seattle waterfront is one of my favorite places to railfan, too.

[Deggesty]

Yard Limit

Trackside the other day, I noticed how much hazardous cargo was on this manifest train moving through Seattle.  I looked up all the different placards to see what they meant.  It was interesting.  No, I'm not suggesting that it's a problem, I'm simply making an observation.

 

Apparently, only coal bins and oil cans are worrisome. Who cares about such stuff as chlorine or Methyl Ethyl Awful (Methy Ethyl Ketone)?

[Yard Limit]

Trackside the other day, I noticed how much hazardous cargo was on this manifest train moving through Seattle.  I looked up all the different placards to see what they meant.  It was interesting.  No, I'm not suggesting that it's a problem, I'm simply making an observation.