U.P. Locomotive Engineer, Paul Lindsay Talks about Regulating Train Length, Recent Wrecks, and Solutions to Problems

[zugmann]

PennsyBoomer

Take a look at how long it takes Amtrak to recover from anything and how adept they have become at canceling trains. Seems to make the freight side of things look pretty efficient.

When amtrak cancels a train, it gets posted publically, and railfans put it on blast.  

When a freight carrier annulls a train for whatever reason, nobody knows; nobody cares.  

 

Kind of apples and oranges. 

[BaltACD]

PennsyBoomer

...

 Take a look at how long it takes Amtrak to recover from anything and how adept they have become at canceling trains. Seems to make the freight side of things look pretty efficient.

Amtrak's inability to recover from situations that seriously delay their trains - no matter who or what is the cause; can be explained in one simple statement - lack of equipment.  Amtrak has enough equipment to meet their daily schedule requirements - no more; therefore they are not in a position to 'cobble together' a proper set of equipment and operate the next scheduled departure of a train or service On Time.  Amtrak is forced into the situation of either running the set of late equipment on short turnarounds until they get the equipment back into the On Time time slot, If they can't do that their only recovery avenue is to cancel one or more trips.

PRR & NYC operated multiple sections of the Broadway Limited and the 20th Century Limited because there was available equipment to do it - there was available equipment to originate the train On Time every day, no matter what 'adventures' the normal inbound train experienced that would prevent that set of equipment from being turned to protect the origination.

[PennsyBoomer]

There's an awful lot of supposition about East Palestine centering upon hot box detectors with the impression that warnings are routinely disregarded. Is that the case, or sensation? The media is just as deserving of suspicion as corporations and I am not sure I believe any of it until there is some thorough analysis presented by the STB. In over forty years of service I had never seen such warnings dismissed without careful analysis, with the tendency to err more on the side of caution. Then again, I have been retired for some years and things do not appear to have improved.

Mr. Lindsay's thoughts are in many instances justified, however, I disagree with the nationalization tendency in his comments. What we have here is a series of events bringing either temporary or longer term focus upon maladies in the present application of rail economies, depending upon what transpires with regard to derailment frequency or chaos going forward. A strong case may be made that regulation has significantly trailed necessary restraints upon economies in manpower, experience, maintenance and operations in general. Regulation generally trails developments. A strong case might also be made that the mergers of the 90s created this situation by reducing competition to next-to-nothing. And Lindsay is right – the highway system is already over-burdened with increasingly large trucks. So there is a valid element of national security at stake although I am pretty sure this is just a talking point and no one in fed'l gov't at present is much interested in that, what with everyone being so oppressed and other fal-de-rol.

I also take issue with statements that the railroad rights of way are in deplorable shape. Look at the era before deregulation and in many cases it is amazing anything got over the road with track conditions – although trains did and often in better shape than now. The railroads have driven themselves into a dogcatch/congestion circus that affects everything from kicking trains out of terminals to tying them down on mainlines/sidings with deteriorating crew bases to dig out of these episodes. I do not think nationalization will cure any of this, any more than it is evident in the highway system or any federally administered program. Good for unions, good for pork, otherwise Beware. Take a look at how long it takes Amtrak to recover from anything and how adept they have become at canceling trains. Seems to make the freight side of things look pretty efficient.

There is something to be said for alternative points of view and certain railroads have behaved cavalierly in many cases and brought this scrutiny upon themselves. Some may say this is a function of our system – money, money, money - and it is to the extent that it is encouraged or restrained and that's a tug-of-war that has been going on since Teddy Roosevelt, at least.

 

[BaltACD]

One thing many overlook when Speed Restrictions are put in place on the railroad - either Permament or Temporary - the speed restriction applies to the entire length of the train - be that train 100 feet or 15000 feet in length.  A short train can be braked to the speed of the Restriction in a much shorter distance than can a big train.  The big train must stay at the speed of the restriction for the entirety of its length before it can attempt to accelerate back to track speed. 

[tree68]

As I recall, the initial reports were that the train had experienced a break-in-two about 55 cars back, with the train kind of draped over a summit.  The initial train was in the vicinity of 150 cars, but that's not what ran away.  Only those 55 cars took off.

The two lead engines were reportedly unable to push those 55 cars back up the hill to recouple.  In fact, the weight of the train was sufficient to cause it to run away down the hill.

A HBD reported the speed as 118 MPH shortly before the train left the rails.  The GPS report of almost 140 MPH doesn't seem out of order.

[Euclid]

Here is an interesting and detailed video interviewing locomotive engineer, Paul Lindsay commenting on how the railroads should be regulated as to train length, and about hotbox detectors among other things. 

 

He goes into detail about how the iron ore train recently ran away and derailed in Nevada.  He said the following.  The train was never weighed, but only estimated at 22,000 tons; and that it actually exceeded that weight. The initial report stating that the train was 50 cars long was not true, and actually, the train was considered to be “double length” which in this case, was 154 cars. 

 

He says this about the runaway/derailment: The train derailed in a 60 mph curve after attaining a maximum speed of about 150 mph.   It was underpowered but did okay going down grade, which was most of the trip.  But, although the power was acceptable to pull the train, it was not able to provide enough dynamic braking to limit the speed going down the grade.  He said the company boasted about getting the line quickly back in service, but that was relatively easy because the wreckage became airborne at the time of derailment and moved about 100 feet clear of the track.  So there was not much damage to the track. 

 

He also speaks out about the East Palestine wreck and the role of hotbox detectors and why they failed to prevent the disaster.  From my reading between the lines on this point, I get the impression that the railroads began installing these detectors maybe decades ago, prior to the monster train era.  But then with the dawn of the monster train era, the consequences of time lost in dealing with alarms and possibly setting out the car were thought to be too costly; especially if it was a false alarm. 

 

So the railroads then decided to not have the crews act directly on an alarm, but rather to have the alarm report to a special office of people who would review the alarm and decide whether there really was a problem.  I assume the thinking was that review of the an alarm might lack sufficient skepticism if it were left to train crews who might accept each and every alarm without an hesitation as to its validity, and thus cause unnecessary delays with these especially large and cumbersome trains.      

 

Mr. Lindsay also shares his ideas about how to solve all the problems that he has mentioned. 

 

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D1mGexQWqMs