UP derailed a eastbound coal train Saturday in Glenwood Canyon, Colorado by the Bair Ranch. Bair Ranch is close to the east end of the Canyon. No injuries and luckily all cars stayed upright. On the down side, CZ train 6 was caught behind it and all passengers had to be bussed to Denver. No idea what caused it or when it will re-open. UP derailed a coal train in February of 2004, also.
Oh my what is going on with UP and derailments lately???/
Union Pacific Unlimited Parking
CSXrules, this is just speculation, but perhaps cost cutting in the maintainence of way department to enhance financial performance?
UP had better realize that all of these derailments could cause serious problems. Track maintenance should be a priority for UP at this point. If not, derailments and other worse things could happen.[xx(]
Check Mudchicken’s posting on the ‘Diner’ (pg 358)
Any pix? [:o)][:)]
[quote]
Originally posted by espee
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Excuse me, Addax–
Do you have any evidence for your statement that UP has cut back on track maintenance? I’d submit that UP has roughly twice as many derailments as a railroad about half its size. From my own observations, I can think of only one or two major railroads that have main lines that appear to be undermaintained–and they aren’t UP! And bad trackage is far from the only cause for derailments.
And as for you, my dear Sarah, when you come to work for the railroad–whichever railroad–you’ll find that there’s always something happening. The closer to home it hits, the more upsetting it becomes, but the wrecks are always out there. (If I were working for that orange railroad, you’d probably hear more about their wrecks!)
The line is now open. UP also put 5 cars on the ground last Tuesday at Kremmling, Co.
Both of these are still under investigation.
Since the first day that a vehicle attempted to move on rails, derailments have happend. The number of derailments that occur on todays railroads are a fraction (a small fraction) ot the number of derailments that occured 20-30-50-80-100 years ago. The big difference today is communication. Through communications avenues such as this forum, 24/7/365 News Networks that have too many hours ot fill with too little ‘REAL’ news, newspapers that try to attract readers with ‘sensational’ stories; almost any time a wheel leaves the rail it gets reported all across the land.
Secondly, with all the ‘Plant Rationalization’ that todays existing Class I’s have performed; line blocking derailments have a bigger impact upon the carriers as there are fewer alternate routes available to detour traffic that is affected by the derailment. I years gone by the first thing that was done a the report of a major derailment was to arrange detour routings over alternative routings within the company or make arrangements with competing carriers to detour the traffic over their line…today the arrangements are made to stop the flow of traffic so as not to overwhelm the capacity issues of the affected line after service is restored.
There are three borad areas of derailment causes…track defect, car defect, and man failure. Man failure is a bigger cause of derailments than our human ego would like to admit and occurs in many ways.
I tell you what, I’ve seen bad track and I’ve seen BAD TRACK!!! It is amazing how many trains travel on rails that are less-than-optimally maintained without derailing, and then there are the trains that rock and sway back and forth and look like they’re going to tip over because the track is so bad!!! (Don’t worry, the last example already has plans to put in new ties and generally make the track much better soon!)
Point is, sometimes bad things just happen. Derailments happen despite the best efforts of those involved to keep things on the rails. It’s amazing just how efficient and SAFE railroad transportation is despite all the “could-be” issues out there.
Happy railroading,
-Mark
www.fuzzyworld3.com
H’mm ever consider maybe a axle broke? [:o)][:p][:)]
[quote]
Originally posted by addax61024