Don't urinate on tracks with electrified third rail

Trains Magazine Transit
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Don’t urinate on tracks that have electrified third rail.

http://chicago.cbslocal.com/2012/04/23/man-dies-after-peeing-on-l-tracks-in-evanston/

An Indiana man died overnight, after coming into contact with the electrified third rail as he urinated on the Purple Line ‘L’ tracks in Evanston.

The man was at the South Boulevard Purple Line stop around 11 p.m. Sunday with two other people when he came into contact with the third rail, according to CTA spokeswoman Lambrini Lukidis.

The man, Zachary McKee, 27, of Ossian, Ind., was pronounced dead at Saint Francis Hospital in Evanston at 11:52 p.m., according to the Cook County Medical Examiner’s office.

It turned out that the man had climbed down to the tracks to urinate when he fell onto the third rail, according to a news release from the Evanston Police Department.

Authorities have not said whether the man urinated on the third rail.

One of the two people the man was with ran down stairs to the booth at the entrance at the station and alerted the security guard on duty to the situation, Lukidis said. The security guard then called Evanston Police and Fire officials.

The London Daily Mail reported that McKee had served four years with the U.S. Marines, in the Anbar province in Iraq and in Iwakuni, Japan. He served in the Marines for four years, until 2010, the Daily Mail reported.

At the time of his death, McKee was working toward his undergraduate degree in political science and government at Indiana University-Purdue University Fort Wayne, the Daily Mail reported.

McKee&rs

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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pDY-0ijiOEQ

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I don’t know about third rails, but when I was in the Marines we were on a Command Post Exercise, and the first night out we heard a loud yell, ran to see what happened, and it turned out one of the troops was answering the “call of nature” and relieved himself on an electrical junction box. Goes without saying it was dark and he couldn’t see it. Didn’t kill him, but there he was on the ground holding the old “wizzeroo” and moaning like mad. All the other guys standing in a circle around him laughing their butts off didn’t help his state of mind either!

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A second place Darwin Award.

Rgds IGN

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when I was young and had no sense,

I pissed all over an electric fence.

It singed my hair and burnt my balls

and made me s*** in my overalls.

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If you’re a Mythbusters fan (like me), you may recall that they pretty thoroughly tested the notion that you could get zapped by doing your “thing” on the third rail, and concluded it won’t happen. The problem is that the liquid stream pretty quickly breaks up and doesn’t form a path for the current to flow. I agree with you that the most likely explanation for the news stories that pop up from time to time is that the person came into direct physical contact with the third rail while urinating. If you think about it for a second, it would be perfectly natural to put one foot on the thrid rail or brush against it while doing your “thing”.

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The liquid stream does not always break up that much, arcs cab form, and a lot depends on where you are standing, ground conductivity, insulation provided by shoes. etc. There are a lot of variables, and I certainly would not try it!

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I wouldn’t try it either.

However, I don’t think arcs are likely to form between disconnected droplets. 600 volts DC can definitely arc several inches (just watch a third rail shoe on ‘L’ train), but the arc occurs when a completed circuit is broken. In the case of our suicidally inclined person relieving himself, a circuit couldn’t form until the liquid stream hit the rail and it would break up before that (unless the guy were kneeling almost right next to the rail).

Still, I’m not inclined to test it. These is always the one in a million chance that, for a brief second, there might be a continuity in the liquid stream that would conduct a circuit, and that, once established, it would continue to arc. With my proverbial luck, that’s exactly what would happen.

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Exactly, and at the same moment, a bit of the liquid would have splashe on your shoes to form a bridge around the insulating shoe leather and rupper soles, and improve conductivity into the grouind.

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Mythbusters or not, I would like to test this theory with two subjects or people. I propose that the following people be made to test the theory that urinating on a third rail can be safe:

1. The person or people at Amtrak responsible for “yield management” ticket pricing;

2. The person or people responsible for the phone menu answering machines (“Please listen as our menu options have changed…”);

3. And this lady: “Hello, this is Rachel from cardholder services…”

Any other nominations?

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I fully agree with your choice of lab rats. But your testing is not complete. In order to have a valid test, one must test whether someone gets fried simply by the liquid stream or by something else. Therefore, in order to have a complete test, your subjects, if they survive the liquid stream test, must also repeat the test while in physical contact with the third rail, in order to determine if there is any difference in the result. If there isn’t, we use a flame-thrower.

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You forgetting a couple any Idiot that has No Clue about the Form of Transportation they are Trying to Regulate. Say FMCSA that have NEVER been in a Truck or FRA Inspectors that have NEVER seen a Train until Hired by the FRA. Or how about all the Idiots at the TSA that think full body Cavity Searches on 90 Year olds is the best way to secrue the airports.

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We have an electric fence that is 10,000 Volts - 600Ma. We have six Golden Relievers Retrievers and not one of them has ever lifted their leg on the electric fence more than once.[&][li]

And yes this fence can arc to the chain link fence with an impressive spark.[:O]

Brent[C):-)]

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i wouldn’t have a problem urinating on a third rail if I were standing on a dry wooden station platform. I’d think twice (depending on the amount of alcohol in my system) about urinating on a third rail standing on a wet concrete station platform barefoot. Myth busters didn’t cover all the bases, there’s still the possibility IMHO.

Randy

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BATMAN replied on 06-12-2012 4:50 PM Reply More

We have an electric fence that is 10,000 Volts - 600Ma. We

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tdmiget wrote;

The voltage and amperage you claim would be almost certainly fatal.

http://www.physics.ohio-state.edu/~p616/safety/fatal_current.html

I stand to be corrected as the manual is at the ranch. The unit was bought at a Farm Supply store. It is about 18 years old and has a very worn out sticker on the back that reads 10,000 volts, 600 Milliamps, pulse 8 micro seconds. It is a solar powered electric fence unit that is good for thirty five miles of fencing. At the Ranch it packs a wallop three miles out. It keeps the cattle in and more importantly the Grizzlies out. Like I said earlier, the dogs only ever pee on it once.

Maybe some of our more seasoned Ranchers/Farmers can enlighten me on electric fencing as I only get up to the ranch once or twice a year to help out.

Brent[C):-)]

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I guess I’m just to old school or naive but…WHY in the world would anyone, man or woman, want to “whiz” on railroad tracks???

This makes no sense.