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Trains News Wire FLASH: US freight railroads announce crude by rail safety initiative
These are all good proposals, but none of them really address two of the high profile disasters. The MM&A runaway involved a train that was tied down on a gradient without proper devices set to prevent said runaway. There must be rules regarding placement of derails at both ends of trains tied down on other than essentially flat track.
The fire in ND resulted from the oil train either being struck by a derailing grain train, or because the train could not stop in time to avoid plowing into the derailed grain cars. Reducing speeds and improving braking will both help, but still will not prevent being struck by a train derailing in the adjacent track or having derailed around a curve with limited sight distance. A rule which would mandate that no opposing train traffic, including passenger trains, shall be in motion on track adjacent to an oil train in highly populated areas would address those concerns. Whether the rule would be implemented by route choices or dispatch control would be up to the controlling railroad.
@ Edmond …Non Railroad personnel were involved in the MM&A incident. Not knowing the consequences of shutting down a Loco, and or air compressors down, was part of the problem. The train was sufficiently locked down, and not moving when the engineer left. There are videos of UP leaving 4 connected RUNNING engines on a flat in the desert for a few HOURS unlocked and unattended. Suggesting stopping all adjacent train travel is alot to ask, and AMTRAK will be the loudest complainer.
This probably will not mean much change for the main lines of the Class 1s, which will mostly already be doing the track inspections and have the trackside detectors. In fact I believe that many have much closer spacing of detectors than every 40 miles. Branches and shortline/regional partners may be more affected.
Curiously, I don’t see any mention of a possible exemption, a low speed limit where the items mentioned in the safety initiative are not available. The risk of tank puncture in a low speed derailment is greatly reduced.
TRAINS should send this story to radio TV and other news media outlets who are busy covering (and IMHO, whipping up) public phobia of oil trains.
These are all excellent first steps. As noted by Edmon Bates and Bruce Bell there is still work to done on parking these (or for that matter any trains) outside of yard limits. As the article notes the matters related to tank care standards and cargo classification is yet to come.
Multiple derails with locks should be absolutely necessary at all times. It is very easy to release hand brakes and even the tiniest grade will cause a runaway. I also suggest placing a caboose mid-train with a couple CEO or CFO types riding there. Really. There would then be some serious attention to safety.
Good information, but it’s not included in media hype. Mpls. KMSP 9 did a spot 2/25/14 that was mostly a “fear” piece. Unfortunate as it may be, the information provided here doesn’t get to the general public. Gov’t impediments to PTC implementation and even the most basic safety info. doesn’t reach the general public who sees trains as an inconvenience to their travel and now as a danger “explosive oil”. The only commercials I’ve seen for rail anything is some on CNN by NS.
Just a question. Is all this attention just because of media hype?
After all, there is definitely a bias in the media and this admin-
istration and the environmental people against fossil fuels. What
about all the other commodities the railroads carry in tank cars
that is worse than crude oil, such as LP Gas and Chlorine.
Surely there are derailments somewhere in the U. S. involving
these kinds of materials, aren’t there? I use to live within fifty
miles of a little town called Crescent City, IL that was almost
wipe out by a train derailment involving LP Gas. This was
in 1970, if I remember correctly. After this happened, it
seemed like the media made sure it covered every LP Gas
derailment or explosion for the next year!