I found this photo of a Canadian National MLW M420 locomotive at a grade crossing being placed back on the rails, after the ice storms of 1998, and, if I am reading the description and comments on the photo correctly, they are saying that they drove the locomotive down the street, under it’s own power, without rails to the heart of town to supply emergency power.
I know that the emergency power usage is correct, but I’m confused as to wether or not they acually drove the locomotive on the streets.
Seems - too good to be true. I’d expect there’s be two problems - one, they don’t steer, but the trucks aren’t rigid so they’d tend to drift a bit and two, they’d cut some horrible grooves in the pavement with the flanges. Of course if the option is “whole town freezes to death” vs “omg grooves in the street” I think I’d pick grooves in the street.
I seem to recall that in my reading of “The Maine Two-footers” (Linwood W. Moody), there was mention of one of their locos going off the rails during a snowstorm and continuing on its own for a distance. I kinda bought this one; as, as I also recall, the loco was outside-framed with counterweights; and I figured those counterweights could have supplied a bit of forward propulsion in the snow.
'Course, it could have been a bit of a story, but…
They absolutely did cut grooves in the pavement. You can see the lines in that photo. The photo is not a fake, this actually happened. There was a freak ice storm in '98 that affected most of Quebec. And I don’t mean just a little bit of snow and freezing rain:
During that famous ice storm, a small town in the province of Quebec lost its electricity (as did many towns for that matter.) CN was gracious enough to lend them an MLW (Alco) M420 as an electrical generator for the town until the power could be restored.
Not so crazy. If you ever get a chance, watch a rather good 1952 western comedy called A TICKET TO TOMAHAWK, which features a nifty little narrow-gauge locomotive travelling from one ficticious Colorado mining town (Epitaph) 70 miles to another (Tomahawk) without any rails. Of course, it’s pulled by a 20-mule team, but it makes it. The movie is a heck of a lot of fun, and that little narrow-gauge locomotive (from the Rio Grande Southern) is just a little beauty.
How much electrical power does a locomotive generate that it is capable of powering a town, even a small one? I wouldn’t think that there would be enough amperage to power more than a few buildings at once, not even giving any consideration to voltage and whether its AC or DC power being generated.
Thanks for giving me insight to the CN’s role for emergency power in the 1998 ice storms everyone.
I never knew it was even remotely possible to run a locomotive without rails untill now.
I don’t know how much power a locomotive can produce, but from what I understand, EMD was able to sell portable Auxillary Power units that were powered by the 567 Prime Mover, I think (Feel free to correct me if I’m wrong), back in the 1950’s
With a DC-AC power converter, I think it could be feasable for a single locomotive to provide electricity for at least 1 or 2 emergency shelters.
Rails don’t magically contribute anything to making an engine work, but a train can’t steer, and relies on the rails to guide it. If they could steer like a large truck, they’d probably work better on concrete since there’d be more friction and therefore traction than with smooth metal on metal.
I lived in Valleyfield,QC,in 1998 and saw that ice storm “head-on” I might say.Some towns have been up to five weeks without power.My area was a lucky one as power failure lasted 44 hours and we were the first to be repowered because we were on the same sector as the local hospital,I’ve been told.
Back to the picture,it was a common knowledge that it was being done (in St-Jean,QC I believe) and it was also known that the loco’s power was intended (and restricted)to a local hospital that had problems with their emergency power unit(s).I never verified this however.
I am assuming a M420 produces about 2000 horsepower. That is about 1.492 megawatts (1,492 kilowatts). Assuming it was used to power the entire town, and not just a few critical loads, they probably had everybody keep their electricity usage to a minimum. If they got the average consumption per building down to 1 kW, then they could power a little less then 1,492 buildings (the number would depend on the efficiency of the inverters, transformers, etc. and the extent of the line losses).
Most likely the power is DC and not the correct voltage, so they must have had inverter(s) and transformers(s) to make the power compatible with the loads.
I don’t know how much power a locomotive can produce, but from what I understand, EMD was able to sell portable Auxillary Power units that were powered by the 567 Prime Mover, I think (Feel free to correct me if I’m wrong), back in the 1950’s
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An SD40-2 spec book shows the main generator is rated at a max of 4200 A @ 600 volts or 2.5 megawatts.
Figuring a 5000 watt generator will power most of the critical stuff in you house, that would be enough to run roughly 500 homes (not figuring in loses due to transmission or conversion to AC).
EMD made a variety of stationary power plants, first with 567 prime movers and later with 645’s. They might still be making them today, with 710’s. They serve as backup power in nuclear plants and in certain places, like some Carribean islands, as their sole source of electricity. Even Hawaii had at least one place with a bank of them. A year or so ago in RMC they had an article on them with some history and modeling tips. Bunch of pictures. too. There were also mobile ones made, looked basically like a B unit, but there were no traction motors.
