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Tuesday, March 7, 2023
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Saturday, September 9, 2017
1980s Train Derailment Cleanup Process
As a railroad accident investigator from 1979 to 1984 I can give you some insight even if it is not in the USA.
The process has changed very much from the 1970s and 1980s to today so I will mainly describe what would happen at the time of the Selma wreck.
The control centre would have been notified by telephone or radio that a wreck has occurred. They would call the on-call person who would go to site by road as quickly as possible. He would assess the problem for several major points. Any injuries. Was there any chance of fire, were hazardous materials - gas, oil, corrosive - being carried and was any leaking or spilt. He may need to advise the fire department to stand by. If leakage he would need to advise the environmental people to contain leakage into waterways and the police if evacuation was required.
After making sure the site was safe he would assess if train could pass the wreck site. He would advise control if the line was to be blocked or if trains could pass with caution. He would also give an approximate time to complete clear-up. This would not be accurate but would be +/- a day or two. This allows control to work on diversion plans. He would then assess what was required to start the clear up.
In 1982 the railroads had big hooks (rail mounted cranes of 40 to 50 tons lift - I had a 75 ton diesel and a 45ton steam). If the accident was minor then a mobile gang would be actioned by road with jacks and traversing gear. If not, the engineer would instruct control as how the wrecking train was to be marshalled. The most important thing was on which track the wrecking train was to approach the site, from which direction and if the jib was leading or trailing. Also if more than one crane was required. A mobile gang may be actioned to site to clear away minor debris and shovel spilt materials off the track so that the wrecking train could approach the site - in 1982, dozers and mobile diggers were rare but common now.
Whist the mobile gang were busy and the train was coming to site, the engineer would look for the reason for derailment. He would talk to the crew and examine the track for the first derailment marks. He would look at the first vehicle to be derailed. In 9 cases out of 10 the cause is obvious and he would mark with chalk any parts which need to be preserved for later examination. This could be a switch defect, wheel defect, track defect or vandalism (notify the railroad police). If no cause found he might action assistance to study the site whilst he concentrates on clear-up. He may also action the MOW (Maintenance Of Way) gang to repair any track and the mobile repair gang to fix any vehicle. All this happens quickly - within 1 or 2 hours of the engineer arriving on site.
Now there are several groups on site and the engineer has to co-ordinate activity. The wrecking gang supervisor will appear. The engineer agrees with the supervisor the action and order of recovery. The engineer will ask for confirmation of time which will be passed to control. The MOW supervisor and the vehicle repair supervisor will talk to engineer. One will say what repairs are required to the track and the other if any vehicle is incapacitated (incapable of running on its own wheels).
Now the big hook is set out and begins recovery. Vehicles which can run are placed on good track and hauled away, those that are not are lifted clear and placed upright on the track side for later recovery. Vehicles derailed and overturned clear of running track may also be left. The matter now is how quickly the track can be restored. The cause if determined can be examined by all those responsible, and once agreed, the MOW gang can start of repairs.
In my day the Civil Engineers and the Operating Inspector came to site and we would agree on a cause. If there was a dispute than this would go to an enquiry. In one case the track geometry was clearly wrong allowing the freight cars to lock buffers (a buffer is unknown on US rails) which when the vehicles straightened after a curve simply burst the track. I kept examples of the rail spikes which have rotted through and held the first vehicle under repair for a year until the Civil engineer admitted his responsibility.
The clear-up is nearing completion. The vehicles are re-railed or set aside the MOW and is completing its repairs and a time for re-opening can be given usually with a speed limit. The wrecking train/s must be moved away. The engineer remains on site and watches the first train pass before departing.
The time for this is uncertain. In the case of the Selma accident the derailment was not particularly serious as the cause was a broken hose which put the train into emergency and cause a run in which just plopped the cars off the track. 17 cars derailed at 45mph out of 51 on the train at 06:50 and no locos were off the road. 10 cars carried hazardous materials of which 1 was derailed but there was no release. I have no times to re-opening but I would expect the clear-up to be no more than 12 hours to one day. The track repairs cost $65000 and the vehicle repairs $295,000. This was not high in the normal order of things (200yds of new ties and new base plates and spikes plus labour of a dozen men, bent brake rigging, some new wheels due to bent axles and tire damage, damaged couplers, brake hoses, bent trucks, damaged bearings plus the labor for examination and repair etc).
I hope you find this useful
Ray State
England
The process has changed very much from the 1970s and 1980s to today so I will mainly describe what would happen at the time of the Selma wreck.
The control centre would have been notified by telephone or radio that a wreck has occurred. They would call the on-call person who would go to site by road as quickly as possible. He would assess the problem for several major points. Any injuries. Was there any chance of fire, were hazardous materials - gas, oil, corrosive - being carried and was any leaking or spilt. He may need to advise the fire department to stand by. If leakage he would need to advise the environmental people to contain leakage into waterways and the police if evacuation was required.
After making sure the site was safe he would assess if train could pass the wreck site. He would advise control if the line was to be blocked or if trains could pass with caution. He would also give an approximate time to complete clear-up. This would not be accurate but would be +/- a day or two. This allows control to work on diversion plans. He would then assess what was required to start the clear up.
In 1982 the railroads had big hooks (rail mounted cranes of 40 to 50 tons lift - I had a 75 ton diesel and a 45ton steam). If the accident was minor then a mobile gang would be actioned by road with jacks and traversing gear. If not, the engineer would instruct control as how the wrecking train was to be marshalled. The most important thing was on which track the wrecking train was to approach the site, from which direction and if the jib was leading or trailing. Also if more than one crane was required. A mobile gang may be actioned to site to clear away minor debris and shovel spilt materials off the track so that the wrecking train could approach the site - in 1982, dozers and mobile diggers were rare but common now.
Whist the mobile gang were busy and the train was coming to site, the engineer would look for the reason for derailment. He would talk to the crew and examine the track for the first derailment marks. He would look at the first vehicle to be derailed. In 9 cases out of 10 the cause is obvious and he would mark with chalk any parts which need to be preserved for later examination. This could be a switch defect, wheel defect, track defect or vandalism (notify the railroad police). If no cause found he might action assistance to study the site whilst he concentrates on clear-up. He may also action the MOW (Maintenance Of Way) gang to repair any track and the mobile repair gang to fix any vehicle. All this happens quickly - within 1 or 2 hours of the engineer arriving on site.
Now there are several groups on site and the engineer has to co-ordinate activity. The wrecking gang supervisor will appear. The engineer agrees with the supervisor the action and order of recovery. The engineer will ask for confirmation of time which will be passed to control. The MOW supervisor and the vehicle repair supervisor will talk to engineer. One will say what repairs are required to the track and the other if any vehicle is incapacitated (incapable of running on its own wheels).
Now the big hook is set out and begins recovery. Vehicles which can run are placed on good track and hauled away, those that are not are lifted clear and placed upright on the track side for later recovery. Vehicles derailed and overturned clear of running track may also be left. The matter now is how quickly the track can be restored. The cause if determined can be examined by all those responsible, and once agreed, the MOW gang can start of repairs.
In my day the Civil Engineers and the Operating Inspector came to site and we would agree on a cause. If there was a dispute than this would go to an enquiry. In one case the track geometry was clearly wrong allowing the freight cars to lock buffers (a buffer is unknown on US rails) which when the vehicles straightened after a curve simply burst the track. I kept examples of the rail spikes which have rotted through and held the first vehicle under repair for a year until the Civil engineer admitted his responsibility.
The clear-up is nearing completion. The vehicles are re-railed or set aside the MOW and is completing its repairs and a time for re-opening can be given usually with a speed limit. The wrecking train/s must be moved away. The engineer remains on site and watches the first train pass before departing.
The time for this is uncertain. In the case of the Selma accident the derailment was not particularly serious as the cause was a broken hose which put the train into emergency and cause a run in which just plopped the cars off the track. 17 cars derailed at 45mph out of 51 on the train at 06:50 and no locos were off the road. 10 cars carried hazardous materials of which 1 was derailed but there was no release. I have no times to re-opening but I would expect the clear-up to be no more than 12 hours to one day. The track repairs cost $65000 and the vehicle repairs $295,000. This was not high in the normal order of things (200yds of new ties and new base plates and spikes plus labour of a dozen men, bent brake rigging, some new wheels due to bent axles and tire damage, damaged couplers, brake hoses, bent trucks, damaged bearings plus the labor for examination and repair etc).
I hope you find this useful
Ray State
England
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Ray State <r.state@btinternet.com>
Date: Sun, Sep 3, 2017 at 1:46 AM
Subject: Re: Train Derailment Cleanup Expert?
To: ME
Dear AJ,
Let me start by saying that I had not seen pictures of the Selma train wreck before and it was far more serious than I indicated mainly because I forgot that it happened at speed which produced the "concertina" type derailment shown. Let me first describe the emergency brake action which is not always understood.
Under normal operation an engineer will make an initial application. The communication down the train is via the air pipe and a 3psi reduction should trigger the triple valves on each freight car from release to apply but because the fall is small the brake pads move onto the brake disk but with little force. It enough to eliminate any slack in the couplers. As you appreciate the signal takes time to travel down a long train. In the 1990s the railroads hit on the idea that if the signal could be transmitted to the rear then this could be more affective. This was done with a radio controlled device which acted like a brake valve on the rear which responded to the engineer's loco cab brake valve. As a result trains became longer. In 1982 this device had not been inverted. After the initial application "collects" the train a full service is applied which has chokes to allow the air to vent slowly so gradually increasing the brake force. Thus the train is braked in a controlled manner.
Under emergency operation the brake pipe is evacuated immediately and the train has to take its chance but because all the train is being braked the result is not often fatal.
The worst case is a partial emergency application not under the control of the engineer. As you can imagine a broken hose part way down the train places the brakes on the closest vehicles straight into emergency which those furthest away are rolling free. If the train is short or the break is at the end of the train then the train can escape without derailment but if to the front the whole unbraked rear section runs into the front section which has its brakes locked on. A train being pulled has all its coupler slack taken up so that the slack is immediately taken in so that the rear cars hit the stationary front cars at many miles per hour and jump off the track. Once off the cars are forced into the zig-zag pattern seen, unless the train is travelling slowly. In 99% of the cases the cause of the emergency application is a broken hose.
The rest of my observations are below.
At 11:29 02/09/2017, you wrote:
The hook is not rail mounted but is a road vehicle with a crane. The vehicle has out riggers which can just be seen behind the vehicle on the track to stabilise the vehicle during lift. Today large road cranes would be used which would not go on the track.
In 1982 it is questionable if a big hook existed which could lift an auto-rack in one go. All I can see is the crane jibs and they look like 40 to 45 tonners They may well be able to lift one end at a time and "walk" the car off the track. Let me say here that autos in an auto rack which is derailed are scrapped irrespective of damage.
Most probable
These are clear of the track and would be recovered many days after the event. The site would be visited by loss-adjusters for the insurance company which would delay clear-up..
A lot. There would be some mechanisation but much would be labor. I have watched the clip and am somewhat taken aback by the fact the that only the underbed lifter operated the crossing barriers whilst the other vehicles crossed the crossing with the barriers up. I am sure this is against FRA regulations. I do not know if the operators isolated the barrier or the other vehicles had insulated axles so they failed to operate track circuits. There is no flagman on the barriers and road vehicles are moving in the vicinity. I am sure the FRA would have something to say about this. If I had more time I could search the FRA regulations for operation of barriers during MOW vehicle movement.
See above for description
The last thing SP would want is to state the facts. Stating that going into emergency caused a derailment would raise eyebrows within the community whilst a defect out of control of the management was good for PR. Within a week the derailment would be all but forgotten. The FRA conclusion has to be right but would not come out until some three months after the derailment. As so few people had access to the FRA database in 1982 no-one would back-check the conclusion.
No problem, sorry for playing down the seriousness of the derailment in the first instance but I misunderstood the speed thinking it was only 4mph not 40mph.
Ray State
From: Ray State <r.state@btinternet.com>
Date: Sun, Sep 3, 2017 at 1:46 AM
Subject: Re: Train Derailment Cleanup Expert?
To: ME
Dear AJ,
Let me start by saying that I had not seen pictures of the Selma train wreck before and it was far more serious than I indicated mainly because I forgot that it happened at speed which produced the "concertina" type derailment shown. Let me first describe the emergency brake action which is not always understood.
Under normal operation an engineer will make an initial application. The communication down the train is via the air pipe and a 3psi reduction should trigger the triple valves on each freight car from release to apply but because the fall is small the brake pads move onto the brake disk but with little force. It enough to eliminate any slack in the couplers. As you appreciate the signal takes time to travel down a long train. In the 1990s the railroads hit on the idea that if the signal could be transmitted to the rear then this could be more affective. This was done with a radio controlled device which acted like a brake valve on the rear which responded to the engineer's loco cab brake valve. As a result trains became longer. In 1982 this device had not been inverted. After the initial application "collects" the train a full service is applied which has chokes to allow the air to vent slowly so gradually increasing the brake force. Thus the train is braked in a controlled manner.
Under emergency operation the brake pipe is evacuated immediately and the train has to take its chance but because all the train is being braked the result is not often fatal.
The worst case is a partial emergency application not under the control of the engineer. As you can imagine a broken hose part way down the train places the brakes on the closest vehicles straight into emergency which those furthest away are rolling free. If the train is short or the break is at the end of the train then the train can escape without derailment but if to the front the whole unbraked rear section runs into the front section which has its brakes locked on. A train being pulled has all its coupler slack taken up so that the slack is immediately taken in so that the rear cars hit the stationary front cars at many miles per hour and jump off the track. Once off the cars are forced into the zig-zag pattern seen, unless the train is travelling slowly. In 99% of the cases the cause of the emergency application is a broken hose.
The rest of my observations are below.
At 11:29 02/09/2017, you wrote:
Ray, thank you! This narrative is immensely helpful, and exactly the kind of detail that I was hoping to learn. Thank you for taking the time to write all of this out, in such a detailed and yet concise manner. That is very generous of you. You have excellent communication skill, of which today I am the beneficiary.
This brings up some questions for me. These are fairly in-depth questions, so please forgive me if I'm going overboard with minutiae. If I am, you can just skip the questions(s)
1) "Now the big hook is set out and begins recovery. Vehicles which can run are placed on good track and hauled away,..."  Is this what we are seeing here from the Selma wreck?   <http://bit.ly/2vSJ9mV>http://bit.ly/2vSJ9mV
I've studied the layout of the wreck site, and this is happening just 100 feet northwest of the wreck site, going toward Fresno.
The hook is not rail mounted but is a road vehicle with a crane. The vehicle has out riggers which can just be seen behind the vehicle on the track to stabilise the vehicle during lift. Today large road cranes would be used which would not go on the track.
2) "...those that are not are lifted clear and placed upright on the track side for later recovery." Â So, of primary interest to us are the 3 autoracks that I outline here on the left, in yellow, in this aerial view: Â <http://bit.ly/2iPEXTB>http://bit.ly/2iPEXTB
In 1982 it is questionable if a big hook existed which could lift an auto-rack in one go. All I can see is the crane jibs and they look like 40 to 45 tonners They may well be able to lift one end at a time and "walk" the car off the track. Let me say here that autos in an auto rack which is derailed are scrapped irrespective of damage.
By calculating the angle of the palm tree shadows (knowing the exact latitude, longitude and day of year), I estimate that this picture was taken between 10-10:30am, about 3.5 hours after the incident. You can see two cranes clearing wreckage to the right. Â
From this aerial view, combined with other angle shots that we have, I"m pretty sure that Autorack 2 and 3 are covering the tracks, while Autorack 1 is about 10 feet away, with the full height of a tipped boxcar between it and the tracks.
(one of my "wreckage location maps"Â <http://bit.ly/2wvn9jW>http://bit.ly/2wvn9jW showing autoracks from the ground)
So, here's what I'm really trying to figure out from all of this:
a) When did they start moving the autoracks?  (from your description, at least 2 of them would have been moved the day of the wreck, as they were covering the tracks). So, this picture is likely from the first day, showing an autorack being shove off the track by a dozer (I think?)  <http://bit.ly/2wsuSko>http://bit.ly/2wsuSko
Most probable
b) How soon might they have been tipped up like this image shows?  <http://bit.ly/2extMxr>http://bit.ly/2extMxr  (again, same day, since 2 had to be moved that day, and if they're moved off the tracks, they are tipped up then?)  Note that a lot of the automobiles have been removed at this point.
These are clear of the track and would be recovered many days after the event. The site would be visited by loss-adjusters for the insurance company which would delay clear-up..
c) At finally, what stage might most of the automobiles been removed from the autoracks, as this image shows  <http://bit.ly/2x0iQjE>http://bit.ly/2x0iQjE (this is the unaffected section of track area about 500 feet north of the wrecksite.) Â
3) Of less importance to me, but still interesting, how would MOW equipment for a wreck like Selma's differ in 1982 from what we see in this video from 2013? Â <https://youtu.be/qbvwLOPZjng>https://youtu.be/qbvwLOPZjng
A lot. There would be some mechanisation but much would be labor. I have watched the clip and am somewhat taken aback by the fact the that only the underbed lifter operated the crossing barriers whilst the other vehicles crossed the crossing with the barriers up. I am sure this is against FRA regulations. I do not know if the operators isolated the barrier or the other vehicles had insulated axles so they failed to operate track circuits. There is no flagman on the barriers and road vehicles are moving in the vicinity. I am sure the FRA would have something to say about this. If I had more time I could search the FRA regulations for operation of barriers during MOW vehicle movement.
4) "In the case of the Selma accident the derailment was not particularly serious as the cause was a broken hose which put the train into emergency and cause a run in which just plopped the cars off the track."
I'm wondering if you saw somewhere that it was a broken hose? Or is this just something you know from context? Â
See above for description
All of the newspaper articles (which may very well be incorrect) state the cause as "a rain-softened railbed" Â <http://bit.ly/2gxONJ3>http://bit.ly/2gxONJ3
So, I was thinking that the ground gave way a bit, and a rail just broke in that area from the movement. I'd love to hear your thoughts on this.
The last thing SP would want is to state the facts. Stating that going into emergency caused a derailment would raise eyebrows within the community whilst a defect out of control of the management was good for PR. Within a week the derailment would be all but forgotten. The FRA conclusion has to be right but would not come out until some three months after the derailment. As so few people had access to the FRA database in 1982 no-one would back-check the conclusion.
Again, Ray, thank you SO much for taking the time to write what you have. I'm sorry if my subsequent questions are a bit much, and I'm most appreciative for any feedback, whatever it may be. You're truly very knowledgeable, and extremely helpful here, and I do really appreciate it.
No problem, sorry for playing down the seriousness of the derailment in the first instance but I misunderstood the speed thinking it was only 4mph not 40mph.
Thanks again, Best wishes,
-AJ
Ray State
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The Fresno Bee newspaper - November 12, 1982
Did you, family or friends take any pictures of the train wreckage and cargo back then? If so, we would love to hear from you! Plea...