It was a clear warm night in Roseville. I was working the extra board out of the crew lounge when I got a call to run the “Santa Fe Shove”. I picked up my engine, SP #5726, an ALCO RS-11, from the ready track and proceeded to the yard to pick up my train. I then called the dispatcher for a warrant to proceed to the Santa Fe interchange where I was to drop off the 5 cars in my train and pick up whatever cars Santa Fe left for us and return them to the Roseville yard.
So I’m standing there, ready to move, throttle in one hand, clipboard with track warrant, car cards, time slip in the other, and radio clipped to my shirt pocket. Just as I was about to depart, the superintendent came over to talk to me and I got a call from the dispatcher. Distracted, I put the throttle under my armpit to free my right hand to grab the radio and pressed the button to transmit. To my horror, I saw my train moving at a fairly good clip out of Roseville yard. I tried shoving the radio into my shirt pocket which caused me to move my left arm. That’s when disaster struck. The movement of my left arm apparently depressed the reverse button on the throttle. The train screeched to a halt and reversed, reaching the same speed in reverse as it had going forward. Before I managed to retrieve the throttle and stop the train, it had split a switch at the Roseville yard throat and spilled all 5 cars and caboose over the landscape. Fortunately, the locomotive remained on the rails
Loud laughter ensued. The dispatcher left his cubicle to find out what had transpired. To add to the humiliation, pictures were taken and I was told by the superintendent that I would be docked a month’s pay (it was the former that was humiliating, not the latter). I was also gleefully informed by the rest of the operating crew that it was the best entertainment they’d had since John (name changed to protect the guilty) had left his train
When I was on the job there was a saying at the fire station. “If your going to screw up, do it in a closet or you will hear about it the rest of your life.”
I enjoyed your story and completely understand your shame. [(-D]
Can you post the photos? I accidently dumped a pasenger car over the edge because I was pushing too fast on another persons RR. I wasnt used to the power pack he was using.
As soon as I can get copies from those who took the pictures. I was going to demand the negatives, but there are no negatives in digital photograpy. Once copied, the pics are forever.
I think the thing that shocked me the most was that the train reversed. I quickly realized that when I put the throttle under my arm I must have applied power to the loco. Everything would have been alright if the train had kept moving forward since the main line was clear. It was the sudden change in direction that caught me off guard. I think that was also what caused most of the laughter. It isn’t often that you see a train suddenly reverse direction for no apparent reason and then pile up.
Here’s on of my better ones, right in the middle of a show.
Of coarse I am running that B&O passenger. Wasn’t even a matter of not stopping in time, I wasn’t watching at all when traffic ahead slowed. 2 of the RDC’s went into the pucker brush sending passengers out of thier seats.
Another good one at this very same favorite spot of mine: A WM coal drag stopped and so did I, but just not enough that I coupled the caboose. When the WM power didn’t move (on the otherside of backdrop) engineer gave it a good tug stringlining about 20 of the loaded 55ton hoppers. Only 2 hit the floor for me to repair/ replace. Red Signals? What are those?
In mine it was more the fact that I had stopped at a yard and was about to go backwards to switch at an elevator…the only thing was that I had completely forgot to actually check to see that I had actually reversed the thing…of course I had not…so, into the helix I went…
Andre…great post and excellent writing…Loved the humor and its kinda fun to laugh at ourselves…what the heck…if you and I dont…someone else will…
A year or so ago I lost a string of cars just at the top of my five turn Helex, seems the athern coupler clip decided to come off, and I heard the freight rolling down the helix…I must have sounded a bit of in despair (perhaps somthing like OH XXXX, you may fill ithe blanks) My wife was in the next room hearing that, rushing she enters the train room “yelling, whats wrong” as she lifted the swing up, at that moment the cars came shooting out of the tunnel at the bottom of the helix…she watchd the string line row of cars tummelt to the floor…She rolls her eyes back and asked…“why did you do that ?”.
During one of my modular club’s setups, one of my larger friends was sitting in a folding chair…had been for a couple of hours. He happened to be seated with his back to our yard, a foot or so out from it. All of a sudden, there was a loud CRACK, and then my friend wasn’t sitting in the chair anymore, he was lying on the ground looking quite stunned. He also managed to knock over about half of the trains in the yard without even touching them. Fortunately our leg design locks everything together but has a little bit of give, so the whole layout didn’t come crashing down. But now we jokingly refer to him as “Earthquake.” [(-D]
Something similar happened on our club layout. We have a hidden yard on a lower level (about 12" below the main grade level) which is connected to the mainline by a 2% grade in an aluminum channel. One of our visitors had an Amtrak train running, and went down to the lower level and was on his way back up after making his way around the return loop. He reached the top of the grade and was almost out of the hidden trackage when we heard “shhhhhhhhhhhhHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!” as the coupler on the first car turned loose from the locomotive. Now, there is one curve on this grade (a necessity due to the size of our building and the location of the lower yard, directly below our main yard) and when the cars hit that curve, off they went. The guest was horrified until he realized that we had put up barriers around that curve so that even if cars overturned there, they could not go to the floor. He still turns red when one of us says “shhhhhhhhhHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!” [(-D]
Over on another forum, Some friends and I are passing this car around. Prior to, I was doing some road testing. I set the train into the passing track, and walked off to talk to the Pres. Some genius forgot to apply three-point though (by putting the UT4R throttle direction nob into “Neutral”, AND left the switch open, so in the process of setting the throttle down, it goosed enough for the train to roll back into the Main, and stopped, right there. The nexty thing I know, the Hotshot Runner kid of the club is oming in asking about my train. I take it engieers aren’t fond of coming around a corner to see this point at them:
Many yyears ago, the module group I belong to had a weekend show at a local mall. This was a rare opportunity to put up a large layout, 200 + feet. Those were our early DCC days, and we usually made the outside track DC controlled since many of our members had no decoder equipped locomotives yet. With the size of this particular set-up, voltage drop was a problem, so we solved it by dividing it into two power blocks for each main line, with a separate DCC booster or analog throttle for each block.
With this large layout, many of us wanted to test the train length limits that we could run. One such fellow, Rick, had about 80 reefers decorated for various breweries. He had this train running along with a locomotive and dummy on the front with another locomotive pushing on the rear, running on the DC line. Rick was inside the layout where the throttles were when his train had a break-away. When another operator noticed it and told him where it was, Rick shut down the throttle for that side and walked up to the point to reassemble the train, forgetting that there was another locomotive on the back. This locomotive had not cleared into the shut down block yet, and Rick arrived at the scene just in time to see the rear half of his train impact the front half and begin jack-knifing beer reefers. By the time he ran back to shut off the other throttle, there were at least 25 spilled loads on the main lines, fortunately nothing went on the floor.
Later on at our NMRA divisions next meeting, Rick was presented with our first (and only so far) “Wreck of the Year” Award!
I’ve requested pics from those who had the unmitigated gall to document my humiliation. Will post the documentary proof when it arrives.
It is my fervent hope that the next user of the throttle I was using will be one of the gentlemen of low breeding and questionable virtue who pounced on the incident like paparazzi on Lindsay Lohan. It will serve him right. After all, said throttle was in intimate contact with my left armpit.
Khan was wrong. Revenge is not a dish best served cold, revenge is a dish best served up redolent of skunk. [(-D]
When in HO modular club some year back, we were prepping for afternoon o/s. When power was applied, track shorted. Turned out I’d left carpenter’s tape w/metal case, on rail in a tunnel; got ragged about this for years. Club members even gave me; “The tape Is In The Tunnel Award” at our annual Christmas party. My contribution. TTFN. …Old Tom aka papasmurf in NH
These stories really have me miss the days of running trains on the modular club I belonged to several years ago. Several members, myself included, weren’t so good at throwing turnouts properly, and one such night, letting a train derail with a few cars going off the track, but not on the floor thankfully. If nothing else, it had been quite a hoot to sing the Addams Family Theme song after accidents and derailments.
I’ve done something similar a while back too…the train with 26 40’ boxcars heading where I thought it was on…main track…instead…is on a spur…guess what happened to the 2 GP7’s and about 15 cars?
