Aiken,S.c.-The FRA plans to advise all Railroads today to re-examine their procedures for operating manual switches like the one that is suspected in last weeks derailment of a chlorine Train near here,a U.S. transportation dept. spokesman said monday.
Investigators suspect that the crew of a local train left a manual switch misaligned at the end of their shift Wednesday night,so when a Train came through seven hours later,it was directed into the parked local Train. The resulting chlorine spill killed at least 9 people and forced hundreds to seek emergency medical attention. 01-11-05.
[bow]BNSF[bow]
it dont matter how much regulations and how much someone can beat something into ones head… human error is always going to happen… it sad that this had to happen…and if it turns out that it was the crew of the local that did leave the switch open…i realy feel for them as much as the people that lost thier lives…becouse that crew now has to live with the fact that thier mistake coused 9 lives lost…including 2 of their coworkes…that is some heavey crap to deal with the rest of your life…but no matter how much regulations the FRA pushes on the railroads…and no matter how much the railroads try to make sure that this dosnt happen agin…human error will always happen… its a fact of life… this is a dangourse line of work…and things can go wrong at a moments notice… and have gone wrong…and will aways go wrong in some way with humans…now you say then take the humans out of the eqation and leave it up to comptuers to do it… well…here comes a whole new class of screwups for the railroad…computer factor derailments and accidents… becouse computers are just as prone to fail as humans are…and computers have a nasty tendancy to fail when you are in need of them the most… it is truly a paeridox…
csx engineer
The human factor will never be removed from railroading. The FRA can pass all the mandates and safety alerts they want and it still will not prevent the type of derailment on the NS in South Carolina. I am in agreement with CSX Engineer98 that IF (notice in caps) the previous crew left the switch lined for the siding, they have a burden to bear the rest of their lives. CSXengineer is aslo correct that computers create their own screw ups. A computer only does what a human programed it to do.
What’s the bottom line of all this? Railroading is a dangerous profession. What will the FRA alets do? Make people vigilant for about two weeks. Then down the road in six months to a year we will read about a derailment were somebody left a switch open. Sounds cold an flipent but its ture. That’s just the way people are. On my road we had a conductor fall off a car making a drop about a month ago and get his legs cut off plus other injuries. He managed to survive. Everybody agrees that this was bad but it did not really change anybodies behavior. We still drop cars.
Another IF: Was the crew instructed to leave the switch lined for the siding by the dispatcher and the dispatcher failed to instruct the following train on their Track Warrant that the switch was in the reverse position?
i think they do on the sd70 and 80macs… god knows they are always having some kind of computer issue of some kind… and when they are running normal…its only a matter of time befor they crash…lol
csx engineer
I think csxengineer and Saxman hit the nail on the head. Sounds like the FRA advisory is a typical corporate/business world knee-jerk reaction that arises when something bad happens.
Ok, so what should they do? Not make any statement at all about this?
When mistakes happen…and they do, it is necessary to address that mistake and ask that everyone adhere to the rules in place.
The simple fact is this, someone made a mistake and people died. Rules and operations need to be addressed on this.
Sure, whoever made the mistake has to live with that, but nine people are dead. To have a caustic attitude toward the FRA for issuing an advisory is in my opinion extremely disrespectful to those families who lost their lives.
I’m not sure I’d give it that much credit. More like something to appease the masses. After all, it’s “obvious” that the RR isn’t paying attention to its switches! So ‘we here at the FRA’ will remind the railroads to do something that they already do, and get lots of press for doing so.
From what I’m reading, appears that an error, not an equipment malfunction, caused the mishap. Despite the negativity that appears here with regard to the big railroads, the bottom line is what counts (which has been amply emphasized here lately), and wrecks do not add to the bottom line. So the railroads are already watching for potential problems. Ben Franklin was right.
I know, there are myriad example of how the RR isn’t taking care of its plant. On the other hand, SRS was in my area checking the rails again, no doubt in the wake of the derailment late last year…
Well, why can’t they tie in a signal to that switch? From what I saw in the papers the train was on a mainline near a populated area. Power was certainly available. Nothing hi-tech needed.
On the RR, the high tech stuff is usually cheap. The low tech stuff you really need is expensive. Putting a switch position indicator on in dark territory gets into all kinds of “vitality” issues which translate into $$.
The gov’t and the RRs really ought to bite the bullet one of these days to fini***he R&D and fund and deploy PTC/PTC nationwide.
The FRA advisory to check switches will do nothing to prevent the type of accident in South Carolina. Think about it for a moment. I check the switch a 1000 hours and then a train uses the siding at 1030 hours. At this point the conductor fails to realign the switch for main track movement and leaves the train in the siding and taxies away. Along comes a train at 1100 hours and runs into the parked train in the siding. Answer me how checking the switch hel;ped? The problem was not the switch but the employee who failed to line the switch back for main line movement. O.K. maybe the switch was tampered with. Replace train with tampered with. The answer remains the same. Checking the switch did nothing to prevent the accident.
In another post on this site that talked about the collision in South Carolina, somebody posted that crews need to watch for the position of the switches and be prepared to stop if not lined for their route. This would be correct if working in a yard. However, I undestand the train was in Track Warrant Control Territory (TWC). TWC is for the MAIN Track. This train was operating on the main track. Switch rules state the normal postion for a switch connected to a main track is lined and locked for main track movement. The engineer expects that the main track switchs will be lined and locked for the main track when operating in this type of territory. If the switch is left other than the normal position, the dispatcher must state that the crew using the switch may leave the switch reversed and then must notify the following trains on their Track Warrant that the switch is in not lined for the main track.
As a person who operates in TWC territory, I cannot proceed prepared to stop at each switch because it might be lined against me. I MUST trust my fellow employees and the dispatcher that: the switches if used, have been restored to normal position and if not the dispatcher has informed me via my Track Warrant that they are not in normal position.
This is not so much different than employee “taking the railroad home in his pocket” by not giving back a track warrant. Both are human failure/brain failure/ failure to follow the rules … sadly with tragic results. Rules are written when common sense escapes a situation and ends in tragedy or disaster.
Robinson, NM in 1956 was the result of human error. The Chief was lined into a passing track with a mail train sitting on it in the clear. 16 people died. The brakeman (?) from the mail train lined a switch into the siding after panicking over which way the switch was lined. This happened in ABS territory with the train running 80+ and the crew on the Chief had to see the guy line the switch at the last moment. In the old ATSF rules classes, it was beaten into us to stand well clear of the switch stand when another train approaches, out at the R/W fence if possible. That rule came from this human failure incident.
Had this rule been adhered to at Radium, CO - would there still be a conductor alive?
The more things change, the more things stay the same…Adding all the new bells and whistles to the equipment is NOT going to alter the outcome.
Oltman is right, WearyErie’s solution is nothing more than a sugar pill.
I believe that trains ran a short article on this within the past 10 years.[:(][:(][:(]
I can give an example of what can happen, which vividly came back to me when I read the story about the Robinson, NM wreck.
When I was working in the IC’s suburban, I was manning a switch to let a train out of a storage yard. Following the rules, I had walked some distance back from the switch. Early in the morning and I was watching the motion of the wheels going over the switch points. At one point, before the train had cleared, my mind said ok, no wheels on the switch, time to reverse the switch to the normal position. I took about two steps and woke up. The train was not clear!! Had I been right on the switch stand, I could very well have thrown the switch, causing half the train to go down the wrong track.
I guess my point is that I, like most people, can have a mental lapse. Railroad safety rules are designed with a certain amount of redundency to help avoid the consequences of a mental lapse. However, they are never going to 100% effective in preventing something from happening.
Credit goes to all you guys working out there for staying alert and doing your best. Things will happen, but I have a lot more concerns about that when I am in an automobile than I do when I am on a train.