How fast ya’ going?
The legendary John Luther “Casey” Jones forever linked the heroic railroad engineer with speed. He was the lone casualty when his train crashed in an attempt to get his “Cannonball” back on schedule. For the most part, steam engines lacked speedometers. Skill and a trusted pocket watch worked aptly for safe and reliable operation. A good engineer has his train under control at any speed. We do, however, know where to make up a few minutes if we’re late.
Railroads don’t condone speeding, but sure appreciate it when their trains operate on schedule. In the years BC (Before Chase, Md.), site of the tragic 1987 Amtrak wreck, individual railroads determined their own qualifications to certify engineers. After Chase, the Federal Railway Administration grabbed the throttle and applied the brakes.
Each engineer is now licensed by their railroad, but in strict accordance to FRA regulations. Mandatory penalties are meted out to offending individuals and their employers for failed compliance. When I retired in 2012, at a minimum, first offenders got 30 days without pay and 90 days probation; a second offense netted you 90 days in the street and six months to sweat out. After that, there could be years of suspension or outright termination.
Even with a speedometer, the engineer is held accountable for any speed violations, so he or she must verify it’s accuracy as soon as their train passes between two measured mileposts, listed in the employee timetable. Although I had a reputation for being “on time” all of the time, before my direct employment by Amtrak in 1986, as a Seaboard engineer, I was cautioned only once about my speed. I was on a local freight, with two old GP7s, trying to stay ahead of the Silver Meteor with an occupied business car carrying the markers, so believe me, it wasn’t easy. I drew the ire of the local radar-equipped trainmaster, but when I took the siding to be passed, with no delay to the varnish, I got an “atta boy” from Richard Sanborn, president of the Seaboard System, aboard the office car. Nothing more was ever said.
Things can (and do) go wrong, however. I was running the southbound Amtrak Colonial between Washington, D.C., and Newport News, Va., on a dark, rainy night, and I had a fresh-out-of-school trainee aboard. According to my watch, the speedometer on F40 355 was dead on the money between Washington and Richmond, over the former Richmond Fredericksburg & Potomac, where the maximum permissible speed was 70 mph. From Richmond to Newport News, on the Peninsula Subdivision of the former C&O, it was 79, so I took for granted that it too, was accurate. “It just seems like you’re going faster in the rain and dark,” I assured the apprehensive new hire, until my conductor, Charlie Prince called coming to Williamsburg and asked, “How fast you been going?”
A check of the mileposts revealed the Barco speedometer was accurate until 75 mph, but would go no higher. We were running 90!
“I’ll take care of the delay report,” Charlie chuckled. “Of course, there won’t be any delays to list.”
Check out the previous column, “From the Cab: One for the ages” from retired Amtrak Engineer Doug Riddell.
