Modeling A Wreck, Too Morbid?

quote:

Originally posted by gg1man:
I have mixed feelings about this issue. True it is a harsh reality of life that train accidents do occur so I would not be bothered by a display of one....
...It is a very interesting question because I think it cuts to the core of how we view our layouts. But, I don't think there is a right or wrong answer, it's basicly your platform and you should do what speaks to you.

I agree w/you, GG1man, and feel you hit at the core of the question. That is, we have a new working-model of an assassinated President's funeral train, available now, complete w/ coffin(s) inside, making its merry way around a Christmas tree, if desired, but we should feel it's too morbid to dislay a train wreck?! You're right - it's a matter of personal taste and personal expression, of ones preferences and what amusements each individual hobbyist feels belong on his (or her) toy train layout.
Frank

As an Engineer with the NS for 21 years, I'm not to thrilled about the idea myself.
I know we all collect MOW item's an such,but they look good parked around the round house on the wreck train track.

I really,really don't like staged crossing accidents.I've had four of them,so it hits a bad spot inside of me to see those in the hobby displaying them .

accidents are going to happen between trains and everything that gets in front of trains or LRV's.

go for it, make the scene. every railroad in the world has had accidents. no loss of life, and with loss of life.

This is the image I think of when the engine went through the station to the lower level. I think this would be a scene to model on the layout

A gleaming 600,000-pound four-unit Santa Fe Diesel passenger train locomotive “overshot the field” at Union Station yesterday and stopped just short of making a crash landing in Aliso St. 20 feet below.

It halted with a third of the 150,000-pound leading power unit hanging in the air, leaning on a Pacific Electric pole it pushed to a drunken angle. …

No one was hurt, but an Army motor pool car driver for McCornack General Hospital, Pasadena, escaped probable death only by a bit of quick driving action. Pfc. Wayne A. Schmidt, 19, … of East Los Angeles, the Army man, had driven to the station to pick up some patients.

Schmidt was directly in front of the locomotive when it ran out of track, ran over the steel bumper and started for him. The locomotive, moving at what trainmen said was “two or three miles an hour,” struck the light car in the side. Schmidt jammed it into low gear and, as hie said, “gunned her out of there.”

A moment later the ponderous engine had rumbled across the 12-foot-wide concrete roadway and ground throughout the foot-wide concrete barrier. …

What an amazing image!

BTW: Broken trains are not morbid. Broken bodies however, are.

One problem you would have modeling such a wreck, is emulating the flattened freight cars. Perhaps you can print some sides out onto paper and fold them up to look like box-cars and then flatten/smash them so they really look the part. Then put real truck sets on or near them.

This would look really cool in the middle of the train and would be farily easy if made from folded/taped paper:

While not really a morbid train crash, I remember years ago that there was a great articlo in one of the hobby mags about a layout that the builder had built a 'showfly' around a collapsed bridge on his layout. The regular trains had slow orders around the showfly and the bridge crews were busy rebuilding the collapsed bridge. Only layout I remember seeing with a display of a 'working' railroad pile driver / work train / repair crew. Very cool.

Now the east coasters are not the only ones that know how to turn trains over. This was within 4 miles from my house back in 06. UP at its finest! Russ



06 Train Wreck

How about just having a model 765 with its drivers sitting on the ties?

quote:

One problem you would have modeling such a wreck, is emulating the flattened freight cars.

Actually its a lot easier than you think. You leave the box car in the cars display box, the kind with the clear plastic window that lets you see all the goodies. You drive to Sacramento to purchase your new box car. You place the box with the car inside on the back window ledge in your car. You drive from the store in Sacramento where it was 104. You arrive in Concord where it is 102. You forget about removing the box with the car still inside. Next morning you go out to your car and remove the perfectly modeled wrecked box car! See I told you it was easy! Russ