[mike nixon]

Bill, you gotta pay more attn when you're working. The **** splatter from when that train hit you would be grusome!

[Cobrabill]

Time for you to go to bed.

[mike nixon]

RIIIIIIIIIIIGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHTTTTTTTTTT TTTTT!

[robne68]

About 18 yrs ago my sisters boyfriend was driving tractor/trailer with wood chips in Oregon. while pulling out of the loading yard in the winter the tractor slid sideways in the snow while crossing the tracks. Before they could unstick the truck the train destroyed the tractor.
During the incident the railroad personnel instructed them to "short" the rails, as in throw chains or jumper cables across the rails to short them together should this ever occur again. As this would trigger a signal in the system alerting the railroad to a possible track issue.
Does this still apply today? If someone were to get stuck on the tracks could you warn the railroad of a problem in this manner? Just curious.

[Keith Vrabec]

If we only had more physics in high school....

let me see if I get the equations right.

m1v1=m2v2

Which says the mass of an object times the velocity equals the mass times the velocity of the object it hits. So how far can your train punt a semi???? (Well if all the energy was consumed in moving the semi in one piece instead of a billion little ones.)

K=1/2 m(v squared) my favorite equation....energy goes up exponentially with linear increase in velocity. so a train running 30 mph has 4 times the energy of one moving 15. Compound that by the mass of a rolling freight train and boy you got some force there....(enlighten me with some numbers here Bill, how much does your average freight train actually weigh? Jim-what about the weight of a small commuter train-even that has the ability to pitch a Hummer a few football fields right?)

Consider the fact that anyone can swing a ball bat hard enough to smash a skull, why oh why would you want to mess with a train?

Stupidity is a great tool for natural selection...As we continue to make more laws to protect stupidity, we only dilute the gene pool more. Hence adding to the genereal stupidity in the population. Viscious cycle...

[Cobrabill]

Originally Posted by robne68

About 18 yrs ago my sisters boyfriend was driving tractor/trailer with wood chips in Oregon. while pulling out of the loading yard in the winter the tractor slid sideways in the snow while crossing the tracks. Before they could unstick the truck the train destroyed the tractor.
During the incident the railroad personnel instructed them to "short" the rails, as in throw chains or jumper cables across the rails to short them together should this ever occur again. As this would trigger a signal in the system alerting the railroad to a possible track issue.
Does this still apply today? If someone were to get stuck on the tracks could you warn the railroad of a problem in this manner? Just curious.

Yes.IF and it's a big "IF",you are in CTC(Centralized traffic control)or ABS(Automatic block system).But if you are in dark territory(non-signaled)It will not work as there are no signals to turn red.
You're not really shorting anything,rather you're completing a circuit.Chains won't always work.Jumper cables or a piece of steel will.

Originally Posted by Keith Vrabec

Bill, how much does your average freight train actually weigh? Jim-what about the weight of a small commuter train-even that has the ability to pitch a Hummer a few football fields right?)

Consider the fact that anyone can swing a ball bat hard enough to smash a skull, why oh why would you want to mess with a train?

Stupidity is a great tool for natural selection...As we continue to make more laws to protect stupidity, we only dilute the gene pool more. Hence adding to the genereal stupidity in the population. Viscious cycle...

Our trains vary from 2 or 3 thousand tons to 18,000 ft ,weighing 15,000 tons(they just ran one of these last week).10,000 ton trains are common.Usually grain or coal.

[sdbob]

Thanks for the info. I'm a train watcher.I feel for the engineer when an accident happens.We had a couple of deadly accidents around here(Derry Pa.)The last was the young women who got her baby carriage stuck on the tracks with the baby inside.(there was no crossing there).She kept trying to unstick the carriage with a train bearin gdown.We just couldn't figure why?? get the baby out and get out of there. I felt for the crew. This area has probably of at least a 1/2 mile if not more of site.

[Doug]

Good thread! Good advice!

In the mid-60's a buddy and I went to a junkyard somewhere near Laurel, Maryland. It was located along a straight stretch of road and you had to cross the railroad next to the highway to get to the yard. After several minutes in the yard we heard a very loud noise. We found out that a 57 Chevy car coming to the junkyard had been hit by a train at the crossing. The Chevy driver was killed and the car was cut in half.

I grew up in the coalfields of southern WV. In the early 50's they were still using steam locomotives to haul the coal. We flattened a lot of nails and a some pennies (we couldn't afford too many pennies) on the railroad tracks. I can "still" smell the sulfuric smoke from the steam engines. Ah! WHat a memory!

When diesels came into use, I came to appreciate the sound of "power". One of my most favorite "sounds" is to be near a slow moving-hard pulling set of engines hauling a trip of a hundred or more 100-ton loads of coal.

[Bugster455]

Bill,

Thanks for the good advice!

Reading your post also brought back memories of me helping my Uncle in the '60's down at the train station. He actually worked for the Post Office but on the days I hung out with him we would make a couple of trips to the station for mail drop-offs. He would walk up a platform along side the tracks and hang a large bag of mail on a "hook". Several minutes later the scheduled train would pass by grabbing the mail bag with another hook without ever slowing down. The whole process happened so quickly that if you weren't paying close attention you would miss it! Really neat, but you had to be extremely careful!

Unfortunately,in the '70s our city government tore down the station instead of restoring it. Now, they want to preserve everything--go figure. Wish my kids could see it like I did in my youth! Also, my Maternal Great Grandfather worked for the railroad. I still have his old oil signal lamp that he used in the late 1800s while working in the yard. I guess that's why my Son has such a love for trains of all types. We even lay out a small HO train around the base of our Christmas Tree. He'll play with it for hours just watching go around the track. We took he and our Daughter on an "old" train ride this past fall. Old trains and cars are just good stuff--a great way to relive one's youth and create new memories! Take care and Thanks again!

[SRR]

http://www.flixxy.com/san-francisco-...al-footage.htm

This is supposed to be a street car in San Francisco. I noticed all the cars have the steering wheel on the passenger side. The horse drawn wagons have all the drivers on the right side also. Those cars seem to be newer than 1906???

[02Hawk]

We had an idiot at Christmas hop a walking speed flat deck going through town during the cold snap (-35C) The train increased speed on the guy and he couldn't jump off a few blocks later as was his plan....(inebriated so thought process was impaired) He called 911 and it took over an hour to figure out what train he was on.....they did get the train stopped 80 miles away and the guy was comotose. He spent a week in the hospital. Lucky.

He just got the invoice for the costs involved ( several thousands) and is whinning big time that it is not fair. Tough Turds

[Greg Reid]

Bill, You probably didn't know (or care) but I'm "sort of" a railroad man myself. I maintain the ATC (Automatic Train Control) system (I believe you guys call it Signaling?) for the Atlanta transit system. The trains are not quite as heavy as your stuff but still considered "heavy rail" as opposed to "light rail".
It's a dangerous job...I think in some ways more dangerous than the big ones....

• The transit trains move 60 to 70 mph and they are almost completely quiet on the approach,
• They run sometimes within seconds of each other and at the most a few minutes apart all day long
• We have the exposed 750vdc third rail to contend with in our immediate work areas
• We have limited wayside clearance to get out of the way, being fenced in and all.

The good thing is, there are no crossings except in the Yards.

[Cobrabill]

You're a signal maintainer.Yep,i don't need to be fenced in on the right of way.Being on the point during a half mile shove at 0200hrs and have a 70 mph train come past you on the next track which is 15 ft away does wonders for sphincter control.

[dreamingmuscle]

Originally Posted by Cobrabill

http://www.flixxy.com/worlds-luckies...-inspector.htm

I believe it's time for him to call it a day. Pretty good reflexes though.

Glen

[6 Grrrs]

Bill, that all looked like common sense items to me. It amazes me how stupid people really are.

[hurryinhoosier62]

Where I grew up, Penn Central (then Conrail) ran the main line between Louisville and
Indianapolis. I've lost track of how many people were killed or maimed over the years
trying to "beat the train". The worst one was when I was about 12. '67 Imperials DO
NOT stand a chance against 3 GP40s. The car was cut in two. The driver survived
but both passengers were killed instantly.

[Greg Reid]

Originally Posted by Cobrabill

You're a signal maintainer.Yep,i don't need to be fenced in on the right of way.Being on the point during a half mile shove at 0200hrs and have a 70 mph train come past you on the next track which is 15 ft away does wonders for sphincter control.

We have a pretty good track record here as regards safety...Unlike the Washington D.C. Metro system. They killed 12 people in the last 8 months that I can recollect...2 ATC guys just last week... and more if you take their entire history to account.
We've had 1 employee and 2 contractors killed in 30 years.

[Cobrabill]

I bet all you would have seen were a$$holes & elbows going out the back door.

[Cobrabill]

http://www.myfoxatlanta.com/dpp/news...ould-do-020110

[Greg Reid]

The tracks have signs saying "No Trucks Are Allowed To Cross Track " at the intersection....

Ohhhh.....That's why....

Someone mentioned, further back in the thread, "shorting" the tracks with a jumper. We call it "shunting" and it appears that a train is on the tracks ahead. I know with our system, it'll stop the train dead as long as it's far enough ahead of it.
Am I right in assuming that that is NOT the case with a diesel locomotive? It just alerts someone, somewhere, that there is something on the tracks?