Federal law permits humping loaded hazmat cars (except RSSM). They have to be in cuts of two or less, and they leads have to be clear of car ahead and following cars can’t be released until the hazmat cars are clear of the lead and must be in cust of two or less.
RSSM can’t be kicked, can’t be humped, can’t be cut off in motion, must be coupled to at minimum speed, and can’t be struck by a car rolling under its own momentum.
Sorry to plead ignorance, Dave, but I can’t recall what the acronym RSSM stands for.
John
Then UP better change their hazmat switching instructions because it allows TIH/PIH loaded tank cars (RSSM) over the hump with the two car, clear of the lead, etc restrictions. In a flat yard they can’t be kicked, but must be shoved to rest or coupling.
TIH/PIH = toxic inhalation hazard/poison inhalation hazard.
RSSM = rail security sensitive material.
Jeff
I have been avoiding this discussion, because I’m too long gone from the scene of the crimes.
Jeff, the special instructions for Proviso used to be different because it wasn’t an “automatic” hump like every other one on the railroad. I know that when I was up there, the instructions were adhered to religiously, but I suspect that the almighty car count persuaded some people to cut corners, and some officers to look the other way.
We did have the advantage of being able to control the retarders to stop cars from rolling beyond them, so coupling a “buffer” car behind them could be done more efficiently.
The “RSSM” classification must have come about after I retired. I’m sure that it covers some tank cars whose release of commodity would be a total disaster. I’m sure that chlorine and ethylene are among the RSSM goodies.
I still get a chuckle when I think about the first time a Schnabel car showed up on the hump lead. It was empty, but it still required special handling, and nobody (else) seemed to know what to do, or why.
You, of course, took care of it without even having to think about it.[:)]
I worked for a local Power Company, if we had a transformer considered essential (a generator step up or very large grid unit), we would have a “rider” accomany the car…
In some cases, also done for over the highway moves as well
Johnny, that’s the truth–I dealt with it every day I worked up there. Eventually folks got used to dealing with me, knew the job would get done safely and properly, and everything was fine.
certain coal gondolas cant be humped
Actually, that’s not true. Those big red signs on the sides of the old steel coal gons say “Do Not Tamp”. I don’t think it’s a question of structural integrity so much as the possibility of overloading the car if the load of scrap or whatever is compressed. There are plenty of other cars I’d have been more scared of not surviving a trip over the hump than those.
i wasnt refering to the steel hopper/gondolas some of the aluminum gondolas have do not hump on them
http://www.rrpicturearchives.net/showPicture.aspx?id=2276746hem
In my part of the world aluminum coal cars have at least 3 restrictions: “RADIANT THAW ONLY” (that means no flamethrowers to dislodge a frozen load as flamethrowers melt aluminum), “DO NOT HAMMER ON CAR”, and “DO NOT HUMP, KICK OR DROP SWITCH”. The first 2 are stencilled on the car’s side, and the third is found on the switch list beside the car number. “DO NOT TAMP” warnings are new to me, but all the scrap gons we see up here are so beat-up, scratched and rusty that it could easily have worn off; sometimes I wonder if they are using old equipment on its last run to haul scrap metal to the steel mill, that would get rid of some empty car moves…
Commodities that I forgot to mention in my original post are Group 1 hazmat materials (Explosives) and Acryonitrile. Acrylonitrile is used to make ABS plastics. It can be very dangerous. It is is shaken to hard it can self polymerize (start a chemical reaction). If it does and gets hot enough it can explode producing among other things hydrogen cyanide gas. Very nasty sutff.
Aircraft parts cars
Almost everything gets humped.
There are few that don’t.
Depressed flats and flats with large, dimensional loads usually get switched out.
Rail trains and specialized equipment usually gets switched out.
Autos (loads and empty), dangerous (loads and empty), 5 pack double stacks, loads that have DO NOT HUMP all over them and loads of pipe or any other shiftable loads - it all goes over.
As for the hump controlling the speed - I see and hear cars hit WELL over 4 mph on a regular basis.
They don’t care. It takes too long to switch a car out. The hump is top priority and someone will be answering for any delay to productivity.
I was in Lynchburg, VA a few years ago on business. During the evening, I visited alocal mall which overlooks an NS yard. They were kicking cars.
As each car was kicked, it rolled off into the darkness, finally stopping when it hit another car on that track with a resounding “bang.” I suspect some of those couplings were over 4 MPH.
Some shippers install accelerometers along with their shipments that will record the date, time and intensity of impacts the shipment has suffered. They will interact with the carriers about overspeed impacts - to what ultimate end is always in question.
A long time ago in a land far away, I had occasion to spend a summer working at what was then, the Lockbourne AFB @ Columbus Ohio. We were roofing new base housing…Over the weekends the crew would go down to Jackson, Oh. where most of them were from. At that time the DT&I RR had a large yard there. I think it was a ‘flat yard’, meaning every car movement had to be shoved in.
The noise of those cars, hitting together, all night, and in the daylight, could be heard all over that small town. It sounded like an Anvil Chorus, accompanied by a redition of the 1812 Overature [with real canons]. I even made a couple of trips down to watch, some of those cars were kicked so hard, I imagined that one could see daylight under the wheels. I know things are now done differenttly, but at one time, things were done expediently on the railroads. That show there in Jackson, Oh. was memorable, even these days. Maybe, that may be why the DT&I RR is not around thses days?
[quote user=“samfp1943”]
tree68
I was in Lynchburg, VA a few years ago on business. During the evening, I visited alocal mall which overlooks an NS yard. They were kicking cars.
As each car was kicked, it rolled off into the darkness, finally stopping when it hit another car on that track with a resounding “bang.” I suspect some of those couplings were over 4 MPH.
A long time ago in a land far away, I had occasion to spend a summer working at what was then, the Lockbourne AFB @ Columbus Ohio. We were roofing new base housing…Over the weekends the crew would go down to Jackson, Oh. where most of them were from. At that time the DT&I RR had a large yard there. I think it was a ‘flat yard’, meaning every car movement had to be shoved in.
The noise of those cars, hitting together, all night, and in the daylight, could be heard all over that small town. It sounded like an Anvil Chorus, accompanied by a redition of the 1812 Overature [with real canons]. I even made a couple of trips down to watch, some of those cars were kicked so hard, I imagined that one could see daylight under the wheels. I know things are now done differenttly, but at one time, things were done expediently on the railroads. That show there in Jackson, Oh. was memorable, even these days. Maybe, that may be why the DT&I RR is not around thse
What where theose “narrowly defined exceptions” to kicking cars?
Ira
My carrier also has restrictions. Some are the locations where it is allowed is listed by bulletin including specific tracks within such locations. Cars with “trombone” cut levers are prohibited from being the car cut off in some areas. Those are usually found on cars with long travel/cusioned drawbars. There has been an effort to paint those levers blue or yellow to identify them. (I think there are OK if they are sandwiched between two “normal” equipped cars. They just don’t want those special cars making the uncontrolled coupling.) There are limits on how many loads or total number of cars can be cut off in motion.
When a manager, who never pulled a pin or lined a switch, asks “Does switching really go faster when you can kick cars?”, you know that practice will eventually be going away.
Jeff