Another wreck on the Norfolk Southern in Ohio.

they are not the only ones

https://www.dispatch.com/story...ty-ohio/69972311007/

The article references a Senator stating that there have been four derailments in Ohio in the last 5 months.

I am sure a lot of these derailments go unnoticed to the broader public. We know about these now due to the focus surrounding the one in East Palestine.

I’m not an expert, but it sounds like PSR. Less employees, longer trains, less inspections. Its all about getting a return for the shareholders.

I have to say, our highways are in need of much infrastructure, rebuilding, and that’s exactly what most if not all, railroads need. Trackwork, and concrete ties, great ballasting, should be a top priority. Also wheel inspections should be checked out often. I can understand it’s expensive to do maintenance, but aren’t wrecks much more expensive in the long run. When you’re pulling 90-100 or more cars, everything must work properly…… I’m hoping the railroads can see the light at the end of the tunnel. Great thread, sad news.

@Carl Peduzzi posted:

The article references a Senator stating that there have been four derailments in Ohio in the last 5 months.

I am sure a lot of these derailments go unnoticed to the broader public. We know about these now due to the focus surrounding the one in East Palestine.

About 10 years ago, probably more now, I was railfanning at a UP yard here, and there had been a derailment. Among other things, several autoracks with new cars went careening into some woods. Nothing hazardous involved, and, as is the priority in these things, the UP was rushing to get the track repaired and the line reopened. The mess would be cleaned up after the line got reopened. I was there for awhile and talked to one to the employees with the company that was handling a lot of the work. Very interesting.

He said his company works derailings in about an eight state area, one of a number of companies across the country that does this work for railroads. That's all they do. The railroads hire these companies as independent contractors to do this work. Those specialized dozers with the side lifts and all the other equipment used at derailing site - these companies own all that stuff, not the railroads. He said most people aren't aware of it, but there are derailings all the time. His company's crews (and they have a number of them) stay very busy, and are constantly traveling around the country handling derailing jobs. The only derailings the public hears about are those where there are hazardous spills, major fires, explosions etc. involved, especially in populated areas. Otherwise they're pretty much invisible to the public. In fact, derailings are not all that uncommon in the real world of railroading. They go on all the time.

Guys if you read the NTSB report it was a broken wheel, not the track.  It does appear they left a hand brake on when they added the car to the train which is what overheated the wheel and caused it to crack.  That's part not following the rules but also I think PSR.  Too few people and too much emphasis on the operating ratio.  Most derailments are caused by equipment defects on the train, I expect that there will be closer spacing of hotbox detectors and more frequent inspections.

@Dougklink posted:

I expect that there will be closer spacing of hotbox detectors and more frequent inspections.

With the advances in electronics and both capability and lower prices, I have to wonder why more on-board monitoring isn't being installed on freight cars.

It seems railroading has a lack of technological safety advances because 30 years ago people figured there would be no more railroads by now. I know my area has stopped trains for the most part many many years ago. Even the tracks have been dug up and turned into walking and biking trails across the city. Sad but true. I know trains are still large in certain areas. I'm just speaking for around here.

Brad

This discussion tweaked a memory of mine.   When I was a kid in the 60's one of our neighbors worked at a facility for one of the big four in Indianapolis (not sure which).   I  remember him telling my dad that it used to be they would never run a train over a broken rail in the yard, but management now pushes them to keep going and it gets fixed when a loco or car is on the ground.    Costs cutting is what he said back then, makes me wonder about today's RR management.

-Mike in NC,

@Dougklink posted:

Guys if you read the NTSB report it was a broken wheel, not the track.  It does appear they left a hand brake on when they added the car to the train which is what overheated the wheel and caused it to crack.  That's part not following the rules but also I think PSR.  Too few people and too much emphasis on the operating ratio.  Most derailments are caused by equipment defects on the train, I expect that there will be closer spacing of hotbox detectors and more frequent inspections.

If that was the finding, (They) should be fired. Unfortunately, businesses today are unable to find or keep workers. Incompetence is abundant.

I say dig into the root cause and address the other items after that.

@gunrunnerjohn posted:

With the advances in electronics and both capability and lower prices, I have to wonder why more on-board monitoring isn't being installed on freight cars.

Cost?

John

Your title implies that there has been another derailment. Has there been another?

@gunrunnerjohn posted:

With the advances in electronics and both capability and lower prices, I have to wonder why more on-board monitoring isn't being installed on freight cars.

Because unless you cut costs to the bone, you don't get record profits. Too few people, doing too much work, in too large an area. Currently installed equipment doesn't get maintained properly, Why spend money upgrading equipment to better technology when it's cheaper to just send in a crew to clean up the mess afterwards?  UP supervisors were ordering trainmen to not bad order equipment because doing so would take too much time and cut into profits. It would not surprise me if other class 1 railroads operate similarly, since it's all "PSR" these days.

According to FRA statistics, on average there are THREE derailments per day, and have been for over the last decade. Since most only involve damaged equipment, we don't hear about it. But with longer and longer trains (this last one that took a dump was over 2 miles long), the potential consequences become greater and greater.

Art, yes, a NS train derailed yesterday in Springfield Ohio. According to reports, 20 cars (Boxcars for the most part) were involved, none of the derailed cars were carrying toxic materials.

Ten years ago in Quebec there was an incident known as the Lac-Mégantic rail disaster, where tankers carrying shale oil from the Bakken Ol! Field in North Dakota burned down a large portion of the town and killed 47 people.  It happened due to the same bonehead thinking that has led to all of the Norfolk Southern accidents.

A little closer to home, my city is the location of the third largest oil refinery in Canada.  Some years back a tanker car was parked on a siding at this refinery when it started rolling away on its own (hand brakes not on?) and proceeded to take an unscheduled tour of some rail lines inside the city.  Thankfully no harm was done and I don't even know if it was carrying anything at the time, but it could have potentially been holding something nasty such as gasoline additives.  (FYI: this refinery also exports gasoline to the American market.)

If you would like to see railways in North America adopt better safety practices a good place to start would be with the insurance industry.  They have the ability to make the lives of railway executives very miserable.  They must also becoming annoyed insuring an industry with such acute liability exposures.

On the ground again?

Gunny

That area had over 2” of rain on Friday with a lot of flooding and standing water. Don’t know if that was a contributing factor or not.

Why is the Norfolk Southern having train wrecks. Does their track need better inspections. Do they have a large amount of ties that need replaced.

There are about 3 derailments a day, on average, in the US.

@Dougklink posted:

Guys if you read the NTSB report it was a broken wheel, not the track.  It does appear they left a hand brake on when they added the car to the train which is what overheated the wheel and caused it to crack.  That's part not following the rules but also I think PSR.  Too few people and too much emphasis on the operating ratio.  Most derailments are caused by equipment defects on the train, I expect that there will be closer spacing of hotbox detectors and more frequent inspections.

Doug,

Which NTSB report/derailment are you referring to?  The East Palestine preliminary report does not indicate a hand brake issue (it was a failed, overheated bearing), and it's not possible for a report to be issued by the NTSB for an accident that happened yesterday.

Mark

@KMK posted:

Ten years ago in Quebec there was an incident known as the Lac-Mégantic rail disaster, where tankers carrying shale oil from the Bakken Ol! Field in North Dakota burned down a large portion of the town and killed 47 people.  It happened due to the same bonehead thinking that has led to all of the Norfolk Southern accidents...

No, it did not.

Mac Leganctic happened because of a lazy or incompetent crew (take your choice…or use both) who failed to properly secure a stopped train. The train was left standing on a slight grade and the crew did not set a sufficient number of hand brakes as required under the operating rules to secure the train.

There is no similarity at all between Lac Megantic and East Palestine.

This is serious.

It's time to totally deregulate the railroad industry; like I have done on my layout.

I say, "let the Railroads BE railroads!' 

I think I was reading about an earlier derailment that resulted in high carbon wheels being removed from service when I spoke about the hand breaker being left on.  Correct, the preliminary report on this one was an axle bearing.  Same detection result though.

Gunnerjohn I was heavily involved in the ecp braking effort back in the 90's.  We had a number of unit trains running around the country with a power and communication line running down the train.  It worked well on unit trains but interchange is the tough part.  On board monitoring was done too but the problems are maintenance and power.  Keeping a battery charged on the car is tough and maintaining and testing a monitoring system on a car that roams freely involves effort that's **** near impossible.  We could stop a train in half the distance of conventional air brakes though, just by pushing a button.  We always got back to the old mantra that railroading is like hockey, not ballet.  Hard to do anything that requires finesse.

A question: given that most freight rolling stock now appears to be owned by leasing companies, what is their liability in the event of a failure on one of their cars?  Do they ever return "home" for inspections?  How often?  Maybe its the graffiti, but much of the freight fleet is looking old and worn.

Jon

@ADCX Rob posted:

There are about 3 derailments a day, on average, in the US.

John

In the United States we have Freight Trains... but I wouldn't expect Politifact to get that right.

Jon

A reading of the Lac-Megantic disaster reports, courtroom summaries, and analysis points to many factors that ultimately triggered the runaway train.  The "crew" of one - the engineer - followed "standard practice" in securing the train on the main line, on a grade, before retiring for the night.  The lead locomotive, which had been generating a lot of smoke, was left running to provide air for the brakes and caught fire overnight.  The fire was the result of maintenance on the cheap - a crack in the supercharger housing was repaired with epoxy and failed.  A maintenance crew was dispatched and shut down the locomotive without waking and consulting the engineer.  Without air from the locomotive, the train started it's roll to disaster.

Through my readings,  I come away with Lac-Megantic is an example of running a railroad as cheaply as possible and the consequences of not doing it right.

WRT the Ohio derailments, I'm interested to learn how the experts will address eliminating wheel/bearing failures in the 1.6 million railcars that are interchanged among railroads and maintenance facilities.  Can the hotbox detectors correlate the individual wheels on a train?

200 car freight.  Four axles on average per car.  That's 800 axles.  1600 wheels.  Approximately 204 brake-line connections...

Each car is on average 19+ years old.  Most cars are independently owned.

Most cars can find themselves crossing the southwest desert one day, the Rockies the next, and maybe through a midwest flood zone the day after.

It's hard to find ONE cause isn't it?

Jon  

@KOOLjock1 posted:

In the United States we have Freight Trains... but I wouldn't expect Politifact to get that right.

Jon

They got it from the Bureau of Transportation Statistics as shown on their graphic.  Here is a screenshot of the BTS Excel document they got it from straight from the agency's website.

No matter how you spin it there are still well over 1000 rail accidents per year which is unacceptable.

John

@KOOLjock1 posted:

200 car freight.  Four axles on average per car.  That's 800 axles.  1600 wheels.  Approximately 204 brake-line connections...

Each car is on average 19+ years old.  Most cars are independently owned.

Most cars can find themselves crossing the southwest desert one day, the Rockies the next, and maybe through a midwest flood zone the day after.

It's hard to find ONE cause isn't it?

Jon

Jon,

Are the railroads required to report the condition of cars to governing agencies?  I thought that cars were exempt from mandatory reporting and that it was left up to the railroad companies to police themselves with respect to car safety.

Someone correct me if I am wrong

John

@Craftech posted:

Jon,

Are the railroads required to report the condition of cars to governing agencies?  I thought that cars were exempt from mandatory reporting and that it was left up to the railroad companies to police themselves with respect to car safety.

Someone correct me if I am wrong

John

Since no one answered I looked it up myself.

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§ 215.11 Designated inspectors.

Been in the auto business many years I don’t understand how someone doing a visual inspection can tell if a bearing is going to go bad in the next one or say five hundred miles.

I have put in new sealed bearings and had them go bad in a weeks time I said it before the the old tapered bearings you cleaned inspected and repacked seam to last longer. Time consuming but work well if serviced properly.

Al

Rich Melvin

^{OGR Publisher Emeritus}

^{The engineer did not have enough allotted time  (regulations strictly prohibited him working past his shift) to set any wheel brakes on the cars.  This was also a one man crew. As a result the engine was left on to keep the air brakes running.  However the locomotive in question was an underserviced pile of junk which caught fire during the night.  As a consequence these cars of highly volatile Bakken crude ended up rolling down an incline into the centre of the town.  This also caused a fire that burned down a large portion of the town and took over 40 lives.}

^{This all could have been avoided if the owners of this regional line had used more than a one man crew  and an engine that was actually safe.  But this was a case of where corporate greed (selfish bone headed thinking on the part of management) and the lust for profit trumped concerns about safety and fhe public good.}

^{Sound like a story that has been told defore?}

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

From Sky News USA - This is the moment a train derailed in Ohio, a month after a similar incident which led to a toxic chemical leak.

Hope to see you out rail-fanning. Gary

Lac Megantic was a perfect storm of factors that led to the disaster.  With stingy equipment maintenance, inadequate operating procedures, insufficient training and safety focus, and human error, an accident was waiting to happen.

And within this perfect storm, the MMA corporate focus on cost cutting was seeding the clouds.

I wonder how PSR initiatives are increasing the risk of serious rail accidents considering the maintenance variability and potential catastrophic failure of any of the 100+ railcars in a high speed train.

@Craftech posted:

Since no one answered I looked it up myself.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

§ 215.11 Designated inspectors.

(a) Each railroad that operates railroad freight cars to which this part applies shall designate persons qualified to inspect railroad freight cars for compliance with this part and to make the determinations required by § 215.9 of this part.

(b) Each person designated under this section shall have demonstrated to the railroad a knowledge and ability to inspect railroad freight cars for compliance with the requirements of this part and to make the determinations required by § 215.9 of this part.

(c) With respect to designations under this section, each railroad shall maintain written records of:

(1) Each designation in effect; and

(2) The basis for each designation.

https://www.ecfr.gov/current/t...art-A/section-215.11

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In other words, it would appear that the railroads can inspect their own cars and declare them safe for use with no oversight.

John

Yep.  Railroads inspect their own cars and locomotives (and track) in the same way that airlines inspect their own airliners, mass transit agencies inspect their own equipment and the military inspects their own equipment and government agencies inspect their own equipment.   And most (over 50) states allow vehicle owners to inspect their own vehicles.

Not sure if you know how railroad maintenance works.  Railroads really do have experts to do these things and they do them day in and day out.   Twenty four hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year.

And a ton of specialized equipment to spot defective equipment, rail, track structures, and the like.

Yes, they really do have people who know what to look for.  And equipment to spot the things people can't see.

Nope, they don't look for a little sticker on the car and take it to the dealer or the corner garage to have an inspection mechanic look at the tires, brakes, exhaust system and windshield wipers before the sticker expires at the end of the month.

Thanks Rob.  But back to my original question: what is the inspection regimen for LEASED cars?

Jon

Jon:

When a railroad accepts a private car, inspection and running repairs become their responsibility while the car is on that railroad. This could include wheel replacement (which would typically also include replacement of the bearings), brakes, safety appliances - what have you. The private car owner will then be billed a prescribed amount for the repairs made.

When I joined my last employer (a chemical company with a large private fleet), I implemented a program at our production sites to have our railcars mechanically inspected before they were loaded. These inspections were performed by mobile shop crews provided by the leasing companies from whom we leased our cars. The mobile units were either domiciled within our plant sites or came on a set schedule. I can’t speak for all industries but, this preload inspection process was not uncommon in the chemical industry.

Curt