Carolinian 80(9) Grade Crossing accident

[FormerOBS]

One news report quotes a North Carolina Highway Patrolman as saying they had about 4 minutes --- not 15 as stated by a witness. As I said, it's too early to sort out all the facts for certain.

T.

 

[Acela150]

For those of you who are wondering why those state troopers didn't think to contact CSX to have trains stop I can answer the question. Cops are not the brightest people in the world. I can tell you endless stories of some of the stupid stuff I've seen them do in my many years as a Firefighter. You want a story shoot me a PM.

I should also state that on the railroad it is not an "accident" it is an "Incident".

It's interesting that you already know so much about whether or not the the troopers attempted to contact the railroad. I imagine there is more than one person on this board that might take offense to your generalization. I know police officers that feel the same way about firefighters, and their generalizations are just as wrong as yours.

Ask me how many cop cars park in front of a burning building or a fire hydrant... My question to them is where is there hose? Cops hide behind a gun and a badge. Firefighters actually do work.

I'm not saying they didn't contact CSX. From what everyone else has been stating they didn't think they did.

If you have a problem with my comments. That's not my issue. I'm stating facts of life.

Now if 4 minutes is the time they had. A guess of about 2 minutes of warning to the train would still provide enough time to bring speed down.

 

[niemi24s]

Not that this number of grade crossings is a contest, but so far afigg may be the closest. Just spent some time on Google Earth following the tracks from Richmond VA down to Jacksonville FL and counted 510 grade crossings of all types. Some were no doubt missed - especially those rudimentary ones connecting two farm fields. This count assumes the train takes the wye in a SW direction just after leaving the station in Richmond when heading South.

[Edit] Repeated the grade crossing count on 11 March going in the other direction and came up with 509 of them this time.

 

[SteveSFL]

For those of you who are wondering why those state troopers didn't think to contact CSX to have trains stop I can answer the question. Cops are not the brightest people in the world. I can tell you endless stories of some of the stupid stuff I've seen them do in my many years as a Firefighter. You want a story shoot me a PM.

I should also state that on the railroad it is not an "accident" it is an "Incident".

It's interesting that you already know so much about whether or not the the troopers attempted to contact the railroad. I imagine there is more than one person on this board that might take offense to your generalization. I know police officers that feel the same way about firefighters, and their generalizations are just as wrong as yours.

Ask me how many cop cars park in front of a burning building or a fire hydrant... My question to them is where is there hose? Cops hide behind a gun and a badge. Firefighters actually do work.

If you have a problem with my comments. That's not my issue. I'm stating facts of life.

Now if 4 minutes is the time they had. A guess of about 2 minutes of warning to the train would still provide enough time to bring speed down.

I'm glad you're content in your arrogance. Maybe the NTSB will consult you for their investigation.

 

[William W.]

What is the damage to the P42 likely to be? Will they be able to return it to service? Amtrak obviously can't afford to lose a single one.

 

[CCC1007]

From the photos I saw, it should be back sometime.

 

[FormerOBS]

niemi:

At Richmond, southbound trains do take the SW leg of the wye. It you have counted grade crossings between Richmond and Jacksonville, your count does not include the many crossings south of JAX, nor the many between WAS and RVA. In some locations, there are more than one per mile.

Tom

 

[RampWidget]

I do not know whether this means tomorrow's Auto Train will run on schedule, or whether it will run at all, for that matter. If you're scheduled to be on any Amtrak train on the Silver corridor in the next few days, I recommend checking with Amtrak before counting your chickens.

Tom

53(9) is operating, albeit 4+ hours late, and has a second operating crew aboard in case the original crew outlaws before reaching Florence.

This equipment is scheduled to turn at SFA as 52(10). With 53(9) that late, expect 52(10) to depart at least two to three hours late, assuming a rested crew is available in Sanford.

52(9)'s departure from SFA was held until 8:00p.

98(9) & 92(9) both operated as scheduled, although 92(9) was delayed over an hour near Lakeland after striking a pedestrian.

91(9) & 97(9) are not operating.

90(9) terminated at RMT and turned as 89(9) to SAV.

Original 89(9) terminated at RVR and turned as a replacement 80(9) to WAS.

 

[Bus Nut]

It seems like it's time for state and the federal government and railroads to do another round of outreach and education to truck drivers about railroad crossing safety. The videos I've found online are dated, to say the least.

They should also add more questions about RR crossing safety to the CDL test. For example, instructing operators to call the RR prior to calling 911. Could help.

 

[John Bobinyec]

From the photos I saw, it should be back sometime.

It probably depends upon whether or not the frame is bent.

jb

 

[AmtrakBlue]

Watching the video on the news this morning, it looked like the engine's front went up in the air on impact. Guessing that's why it flipped.

 

[user 1215]

I would guess there are 250 grade crossings between Richmond and Jacksonville. Closing or bridging over them all would be an impossible expense.

That number's got to be off by at least an order of magnitude.

There are that order of grade crossing between Miami and Jacksonville on the FEC is what I am told. I am sure there are more than 25 gated grade crossings between Richmond and Jacksonville.

Ahh - but Ryan didn't state in which direction he was off by an order of magnitude. He COULD have meant there were 2,500 crossings!

Not that this number of grade crossings is a contest, but so far afigg may be the closest. Just spent some time on Google Earth following the tracks from Richmond VA down to Jacksonville FL and counted 510 grade crossings of all types. Some were no doubt missed - especially those rudimentary ones connecting two farm fields. This count assumes the train takes the wye in a SW direction just after leaving the station in Richmond when heading South.

Are we playing by Price is Right rules? Closest without going over?

 

[jis]

OK, as expected the entire Atlantic Coast Service is now in Service Disruption, except 90, which is about to arrive into Rocky Mount. Presumably it will terminate there since it has nowhere to go, with passengers bustituted to Richmond. I am almost certain that 91 will be held in Washington. 89 will probably have to go back to Petersburg or Richmond. Wonder if they will bus bridge Richmond to Rocky Mount.

So they did bus bridge. Well played Amtrak.
Too bad 91 and 97 were terminated in Washington without any further arrangements though.

I wonder if they will send empty consists south to balance out the consist situation, or simply do some more cancellation south to north to balance things out.

 

[niemi24s]

After spending about 3 hours figuring out the most likely way South out of Richmond and scrolling down 643 602 miles of track on the Easternmost route using Google Earth, I just picked afigg's answer because...uh...er...just because I did. Whether there were 2½, 25, 250 or 2500 grade crossings didn't seem to matter too much anymore - Mr. Sandman (♫) was calling my name. :blink:

But as the two end points of the search had been specified, the task was simple but mind numbing. One like the following would be much much more difficult:

Q: Which two consecutive stations on any Amtrak route have the most grade crossings between them?

 

[xyzzy]

Q: Which two consecutive stations on any Amtrak route have the most grade crossings between them?

Worthy of a thread of its own.

 

[FormerOBS]

Update from today's southbound Auto train:

Departed Lorton a bit before 9 p.m. last night. Normal running should have placed he A-T at the "incident" site around 12:30 a.m.

Delays encountered north of Halifax. Passed Halifax around 3:00 a.m.

Now underway with an expected arrival time in late afternoon. 4:00 - 5:00 p.m. is the estimate I heard, but I can't vouch for the accuracy of that.

I understand the northbound Auto Train may be doing better, but I have no info on that.

I have heard nothing about the condition of the engineer(s), and am very concerned about that.

Tom

 

[afigg]

After spending about 3 hours figuring out the most likely way South out of Richmond and scrolling down 643 miles of track on Google Earth, I just picked afigg's answer because...uh...er...just because I did. Whether there were 2½, 25, 250 or 2500 grade crossings didn't seem to matter too much anymore - Mr. Sandman (♫) was calling my name. :blink:

But as the two end points of the search had been specified, the task was simple but mind numbing. One like the following would be much more difficult:

It would likely have been easier to locate track maps or CSX timetables for the A-line and count the number of crossings that way. The FRA has an Rail Crossing locator database app for smartphones (and tablets) that show ALL crossings on the map including private, public, grade separated (over or under) with links to incident reports for each crossing, if you really want to dive into it.

I have a track map from one of the Richmond to DC track improvement studies which has a track map with planned 3rd track segments and notations for all the grade crossings. Counting the track map, there are 8 remaining grade crossings between Fredericksburg and Alexandria, including one private grade crossing. There are lot more grade crossings between Fredericksburg and Staples Mill station, so those will be a costly challenge to deal with someday. But I can see an funded effort, as part of a 3rd track upgrade, to separate all the remaining grade crossings north of Fredericksburg in the interest of VRE and Amtrak safety.

 

[xyzzy]

I have it on good authority that the two on the locomotive (engineer and trainee) are banged up but ok. Haven't heard about the six crew members in the train cars.

 

[keelhauled]

It seems to me like if people had died this would have become a much bigger story. Given that no one involved (Amtrak, police department, hospital, etc) has confirmed deaths by now (plenty of time to notify next of kin), I for one am assuming that there are no fatalities (unless an injury becomes fatal at some point).

 

[AmtrakBlue]

It seems to me like if people had died this would have become a much bigger story. Given that no one involved (Amtrak, police department, hospital, etc) has confirmed deaths by now (plenty of time to notify next of kin), I for one am assuming that there are no fatalities (unless an injury becomes fatal at some point).

It's been on my local and national news since yesterday. How much bigger story are you talking about?

 

[FormerOBS]

Southbound Auto Train is now in the vicinity of Jesup, GA, approx. 3 hours from Sanford.

 

[neutralist]

What's it going to take in order to end the callous, reckless disregard for railroad crossings? Jailing the drivers and their employers? Massive fines? They just cannot be educated.

Capitalism demands performance metrics. Speed and time elapsed are some of the examples of performance metrics by truck drivers. With the current economy, it is understandable that people will push to the edge.

Same with people modifying the truck meters so that they can drive 36 hours without sleep and without being detected.

 

[jis]

Southbound Auto Train is now in the vicinity of Jesup, GA, approx. 3 hours from Sanford.

So theoretically they could have run 91 and 97 too. They'd have had to bustitute ORL - Tampa.
I still wonder how they are going to get the consists in the right place. Presumably 92 and 98 on 3/11 will be canceled?

 

[keelhauled]

It seems to me like if people had died this would have become a much bigger story. Given that no one involved (Amtrak, police department, hospital, etc) has confirmed deaths by now (plenty of time to notify next of kin), I for one am assuming that there are no fatalities (unless an injury becomes fatal at some point).

It's been on my local and national news since yesterday. How much bigger story are you talking about?

I've hardly seen a thing. There were the initial articles run, then one about someone who apparently was in a car crash and then this, but other than that, very little outside of industry specific sources.

 

[Domefoamer]

So far, it sounds like the state trooper on the scene failed his responsibility to stop the train. hat would place a huge liability on the state government-- ironic, in the light of the recent Hoosier State controversy, where the state didn't want to be legally responsible for any mistakes in running the RR.

What can we do to reduce these accidents, which seem to strike Amtrak almost monthly? Eliminating all grade crossings isn't financially feasible (or is that "politically feasible"?). Trucker licensing should be revised to include extensive training drilling into these guys' heads that although the feel like Kings of the Road, to a moving train they're just a speed bump. And cops need to be trained to follow the notification procedures, of course.

Then, let's throw a little technology at the problem. It shouldn't take much invention. Using standard burglar alarm technology, let's include infrared monitoring at all passenger rail grade crossings. If a solid object remains on the rail for, say, 15 seconds or more, an alert would be sent to a dispatcher. Any junior engineer with ADT ought to be able to devise this. It ought to have been included in the PTC program, though I've never heard of that. For every sleeping engineer's overspeed accident, there seem to be a dozen of these crossing mishaps occurring.

Will it cost money? Of course, but probably less than we spend in placing closed-circuit cameras into mini-marts.