When were paddles/discs like the ones below commonly used as daytime signaling on the end of cabooses?
Although I’ve seen photos of them in use before, I did a google search for them this morning but couldn’t find even one photo. [:S]
I did discover that the Santa Fe used a wigwag version on a few of their cabooses:
Being a fan of wigwags, that was an enjoyable find. Wouldn’t have flown on the NYC though.
Anyhow, thanks for any info on the paddle/disc-type signals…
Tom
They were common on the SP&S, and on the BN for awhile, at least on the old SP&S lines. In answer to the specific question, on THIS (SP&S) railroad, from the beginning until very roughly 1975.
In Ed Austin’s fine book, “Burlington Northern Washington, Volume 1”, there are a number of photos showing this.
My favorite is of an ex-GN “sports model” repainted into BN colors (page 107, BN 10370, August 17, 1974).
Here, illustrating “sports model”, is one without the flags:
and here’s a non-sports one WITH a flag:
I think the flag requirement ended when a caboose had a red light lit. So, once a caboose had them, the flags disappeared. A BRIGHT red light (NOT a marker light) to the rear would seem to have a lot more visual reach, which can explain why they were so popular on passenger trains.
But the caboose in the photo from the book DID have a red/green light available, yet had two red flags.
Ed
The point of a red flag or red light or red lit markers was to warn following trains of an obstruction.
Sometimes there were additional “features”. In particular, changing the red color to yellow or green, sometimes on only one side, would usually tell a following train that the former was in the clear. I truly wonder what use a tiny green flag would actually BE.
I think the Santa Fe wig-wag was meant for the latter purpose. And I suspect that a caboose would also carry red flags and/or markers for the more typical end of train indicator.
Here’s an article about the Santa Fe wig-wags:
http://old.atsfrr.org/resources/Sandifer/WigWag/Index.htm
You’ll see a photo of a caboose at the rear of a train with both the wig-wag AND markers.
In summary:
The red flag/light was an end-of-train warning.
All other colors to the rear (markers being able to be lit to the side, also) were “signal devices”, as were the wig-wags.
Ed
Here’s another very nice shot:
Note that the red light is available. MAYBE it’s “broke”.
The one on the left looks strangely homemade. And strangely similar to the one showing on the Big Sky Blue car.
I think there were sometimes two-sided flags, say red and green. I would worry about an accidental “flip”. But as I hinted elsewhere, I don’t see what good the flags would do, as by the time you see them; it would seem you’d be too close to react. “Mikey. Did you bring your binoculars this trip?”
Ed
PS: That’s also a very nice photo of a ballasted multi-track through girder bridge! That plank is a new one on me.
Note the track is curved. Reminds me of a topic earlier…
I recall seeing the “day markers” on my young days of hanging around the New York Central.
The earliest photographic evidence I have shows them in use in March of 1962. This seems to align with their mention of them in my October 28, 1962 Lake Division timetable:
NYCS_ETT12_10-28-62 by Edmund, on Flickr
Rule 19.
Probably more important than any kind of warning device the markers were necessary to designate the end of the train. No operator can report a train “by” without actually seeing the marker, weather it be a ratty old flag stuck in the knuckle of the last coupler or fancy illuminated Adlake streamlined markers built in to the newest observation cars. It is not a train without those markers.
The actual, bright red markers we see today are the result of FRA studies and the higher visibility was deemed necessary.
Those Santa Fe paddles were used for communication with the engine crew and I don’t believe they were related to any “marker” rules. I’ll have to follow up on that. Marker lamps were required per usual timetable rules. Radios and excess-height cars made the wig-wags obsolete.
IF I find photos of usage of the NYC day markers earlier than 1962 I’ll update. My 1956 rulebook makes no mention of them. I actually had a pair a while back. I loaned them to my nephew and he left them on the back of a car he was moving from Cincinnati to Chicago… then forgot they were there! Bye-bye markers.
I don’t recall any actual “reflectorization” on them. Simply painted a bright red. Perhaps some were actually “Scotchlite” but I’m guessing after buying a number of them the money-tight NYC began maki
I believe the ATSF wig-wags were only for signaling the engine crew; in fact I think some of them actually used searchlight-signal optics (if that reference to ‘searchette’ 4" bulbs means what I think it will). There is no light to the rear at all, even in an era other roads were implementing red or Mars lights to front and rear for emergency or unanticipated stops, for which a light on an extendable or swinging paddle would have been near-perfect.
You are confusing markers with automobile tailights.
The markers tell trains being met or passed that all the train is by. It a train meets another train and the markers go by the train being met, that means the ENTIRE train has gone by and its afe for the waiting train to leave. If the there is no marker, then the train waiting still has to wait for the rest of the train.
They aren’t the thing that tells a following train to stop. That is done by signals or actions a mile to miles behind the train. By the time the following train could see the caboose it is expected to be moving slow enough to stop short of or within half the range of vision of the train ahead, i.e. moving very slow.
So you have these red flags at the rear of the train. And when an approaching train can get near enough to see whether the flags are there or not, that train must take proper action.
If the flags are there, there is probably no action needed.
If the flags are not there, what action should this train take (being perhaps 200 yards away)?
My point is that all actions required must be safely carried out within 200 yards of the flags, or lack thereof.
What actions should the crew take, when 200 yards from rolling stock apparently on their track, that show no flags?
Consideration should be given that this may be ABS signaling, and that the signaling is giving our train a clear track.
What fits is that the stopped train has lost part of its
Hell no, STOP.
STOP.
You had better be planning to stop, have the brakes set way before 200 yards.
I have no idea what you are asking.
Dave,
Thank you for your responses.
Am I correct in now believing that the presence of flags on the rear of a train is NOT to prevent REAR-END collision?
And that they reason they were used was for scenarios like this (pretty much restating what you said):
Train A is in a siding, waiting for Train B, which is to approach from the opposite direction. Train B passes, but there are no flags on the end of the train. Train A then must wait in the siding until the missing part of Train B is “fetched”, quite likely by a backwards movement of the front of Train B. And then the flags would properly pass.
Train C, following Train B, may well crash into the now “missing” rear part of Train B. But that is not related to the flags on Train B. ABS signaling would be a real convenience. Which explains its enthusiastic adoption some time ago.
This does not bring in telegraphy, nor dispatchers into the discussion, of course.
It is difficult to let go of the idea that two red flags or two red lights on the rear of a train are NOT there to prevent rear-end collision.
I believe the use of bright and frequently oscillating red lights at the rear of passenger trains WAS to do that protecting. And that when the red light was on, it could be accepted as a substitute for the red flags or markers.
Ed
Suppose the rear car became uncoupled after breaking an axle, and rolled off the ROW complete with truck parts, taking the markers (or red flag stuck in the hole provided for it by AAR standards in the coupler knuckle). It is a little more difficult to account for such a thing occurring without causing a UDE, but further assume an accidentally-closed angle cock or other effective event.
The take-home message is that the use of red flags as markers in the rulebook sense is not the same thing as, say, Conrail requiring two red lights on the ‘back’ end of moving equipment, or transit systems displaying red lights to the rear when running. Presumably by extension, the use of red marker lights is a nighttime extension of the flag usage: to connote that the end of the official ‘train’ (remember the rulebook definition of ‘train’?) has passed a given point.
As an aside, I have thought for many years that a ‘correct’ explanation of the recorded time of 7002’s train between AY and Elida stems from the former recording the time the markers passed him (as in the phrase “#6 by”) while the former recorded the time the front of the train reached his position. Also explains why the caboose lights were so dim that Casey had insufficient warning to stop.
It is also pretty evident that the rulebook definition of a ‘stop’ flag or light is that which is walked, probably a considerable distance, back by the relevant employee, to where it can be seen in actual time to bring the train to a stop. Which even in the age of effective air brakes is most often a distance far longer than the sight distance to lights on the caboose
Of course much depends on A) the era and B) the signal system in place and C) any train orders in effect.
The main “protection” came in the form of the flagman. Of course there were times when a fast approaching following train made contact with the slower or stopped preceeding train before the flagman even had a chance to get in place to offer protection. Torpedoes and dropped fusees were yet another form of protection.
I’m not aware of any railroad that recognized a Mars or Gyra warning light as a substitute for markers. “Generally” those only activated when brake pipe pressure dropped below a set point, indicating an emergency application.
However, here’s the Santa Fe displaying one red ‘eyeball’ and no other marker so presumably the AT&SF accepts this as a marker.
Super-Chief_67 by Edmund, on Flickr
It does not appear to be an oscillating light, just solid red. On the other hand:
Mr_Claytor by Edmund, on Flickr
Mr. Claytor, here has a red flag by day and the lantern, presumably, to be illuminated prior to dusk. Curious as to why no “true” markers in the brackets (maybe he didn’t want to scratch the paint?). In this case the similar, single red light doesn’t count as a marker.
This Rock Island E6 is the rear of the tra
Thanks, Ed. I seem to remember seeing photos of them on later cabooses but was curious about the era used.
Tom
The Consolidated Code of Operating Rules was used by most of the railroads in the Northwest.
The 1959 edition has this:
19(D). On passenger trains so equipped, red rear end light, when not operated automatically must, unless otherwise provided, be displayed in oscillating position from sunset to sunrise…It must also be displayed in oscillating positin by day when the train is moving under circumstances in which it may be overtaken by another train, or other emergency conditions require.
There is nothing requiring it to be specifically connected to brake line activation. I have one photo of such a setup where there is clearly NOT a connection.
In this video shot around Spokane in 1958, all passenger trains display such lights. One UP one appears not to have markers. Another one does.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JDO_Fu-U33A&t=76s
There appears not to be anything prohibiting using it at all times, which seems the best choice.
Ed
Re: cabooses and red lights
From Holbrook and Lorenz’s “Waycars of the Chicago, Burlington, & Quincy RR”:
I’m looking at a photo of brand new Burlington NE12 waycars (cabooses) that feature a big red light on the end, just under the roof (see also photo of Burlington caboose earlier in the topic). Photo date is 1954.
Most of the photos showing waycars in operation that have the red light DO NOT show flags or standard markers. There is an especially neat picture featuring swirling snow as the train travels on what appears to be a three or four track main.
Different railroads had different rules, of course.
Ed
Glad it helped, Tom. I’ve since uncovered an earlier photo showing a day marker in use in July of 1961:
https://nycshs.files.wordpress.com/2014/02/pages-from-1975q1.pdf
Go to page 10. Also on pg. 16 is a photo of a bay window with a day target, plus several others scattered throughout the issue.
Another curious thing I’ve come across now. In three cases I’ve found photos of NYC cabooses with “skeleton” kerosene markers hanging from the brackets!
No lenses, presumably no font. Quite curious.
NYC_wood-caboose by Edmund, on Flickr
Regards, Ed
So this topic is really just about NYC practice, not the general case?
I guess the Santa Fe wig-wag threw me off.
Ed
Mars_Signal by Edmund, on Flickr
Mars_Pressure-switch by Edmund, on Flickr
I could be wrong.
Regards, Ed
Notice the instructions say “does not interfere with manual control” unless you have a brake pressure trigger.
I can’t lay my hands on my older rulebooks right now, but I do remember that in early Consolidated Code and C&NW rulebooks, it specifically states that marker lamps do not have to be lit during the day to be considered valid markers.
Remember, the purpose of markers is simply to say “That’s all, folks!”