Still more Wednesday rail news:
— Canada’s Transportation Safety Board is seeking a better way to test train air brakes as a result of the 2019 derailment of a Canadian Pacific train near Field, B.C., that killed three crew members. The crewmen were killed when the train ran away on Kicking Horse Pass, derailing two of three locomotives and 99 of 112 cars [see “Three dead in CP derailment in British Columbia,” Trains News Wire, Feb. 4, 2019, and “Investigations into fatal Canadian Pacific runaway train continue nearly a year afterward,” Trains News Wire, Jan. 28, 2020.] The Canadian Press reports that the TSB has asked Transport Canada what it intends to do to address the current shortcomings in air-brake testing. A TSB spokesman said Transport Canada has not responded to the letter and is not required to do so.
— The unions that represents Port Authority Trans-Hudson commuter rail workers are pressing for COVID-19 testing, hazard pay, and a death benefit after the death of one of the workers for the service between New York and New Jersey in April. Robert Elijah, 61, was a member of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 864, one of eight PATH unions working under contracts that expired in 2011 and 2012, reports the Chief-Leader, a New York City weekly focusing on government employees and civil servants. Under the National Railway Labor Act, the expired contracts remain in force until a new agreement is reached. The virus concerns have added to the long-running battle for a new contract, and have hit some unions hard; the president of the Brotherhood of Railway Signalmen said 29 of the union’s 64 PATH members were quarantined at one point in the pandemic. New York’s MTA has agreed to a $500,000 death benefit for its workers.
— A group seeking the permanent opening to pedestrians of a historic Mississippi River bridge used by Kansas City Southern in Vicksburg, Miss., is continuing its efforts, although they have been slowed by the COVID-19 virus. The Vicksburg Post reports the Friends of the Vickburg Bridge continues to pursue talks with the Warren County Board of Supervisors and Warren County Bridge Commission about opening the former road deck of the former U.S. 80 bridge, which opened in 1930 and was closed to vehicle traffic in 1998, on a regular basis. Currently, it is only open for a handful of special events. The supervisors have held discussions with the bridge commission and railroad about an engineering study to determine a way for trains and pedestrians to coexist on the bridge.
Definitely learned something new re: air brakes. I thought they had a fail – safe design that required air pressure to release brakes, such that lack of reservoir pressure results in full application by default. Mr. Westinghouse was a smart person, but they are flawed in that brakes release in absence of air pressure.
It also allows one to kick cars or roll cars off a hump. In trucks(highway) there are two air lines. The red is the emergency and parking line. It has to stay charged to release the brakes. The blue line is the service line. The service line only had pressure when the brakes are applied. It seems to me that a rethink of railroad airframes is needed. With railroads pushing the length of trains, at some point your going to need a midtrain source of air. Adding in an antilock function to prevent wheel slid would also be a improvement. As I’ve often said I’m no great expert just a worn out truck driver. Thx??
Thank you, W Cook. I was wondering if that would be effective. I learned something from your comment.
While I recognize the importance of limiting hours of service to prevent crew fatigue, couldn’t there be a rule that made an exception if the train would have to wait for a new crew to arrive in a dangerous location? Or, a rule that required a crew to find a safe place to stop in advance of going dead if it were not certain that they could reach a safe stopping place within their hours of service?
On the Vicksburg bridge, I’ve always believed that twelve foot or higher chain link or wrought iron fencing will do the trick. Besides, all I’ve ever seen of trains I’ve witnessed crossing that bridge, is them creeping along at restricted, approximately jogging speed of ten miles per hour or lower.
Wrong Robert Ray and wrong Anna Harling. The inbound engineer as soon as he had the train stopped he should have put all the units in reverse, including the mid and rear DPU and recharge his train line. When the lead engineer control value is in Emergency Position, it makes the train line at zero pressure and nothing is recharging the emergency portion of the reservoirs on the all the cars in the train. Hand brakes could have been used on 10% of the train length. There is no need for new rules, just need for crew knowledge of how air brakes work. The dynamics brakes cannot stop a runaway train. The train sat for over 2 hours at -20 below F and in that time the air pressure in the car piston leaked out and the brakes released and the pressure in reservoirs on the train is drained to near zero, the same as the train line. The pumps on the locomotives were not charging the train line account the handle of the brake valve was found in the Emergency Position, and that dead crew radioed that information to the dispatcher. The 3 crew men were killed by the inbound engineer action. When will he be charged?
To follow on Anna, the Rio Grande had a lot of long 4 % grades on it narrow gauge lines. I believe that their cars had dual brake systems, the usual automatic air brakes now used universally and the original straight air brakes. The advantage of the straight air brakes was that the air pressure came from the locomotive; as long as the lines were connected and the engine’s air pumps worked the train would have working brakes. This avoided the problem with automatic air brakes of the brakes losing force as air leaked out through the more primitive 19th century seals (the air reservoir, brake cylinder and connections). The disadvantage for straight air of course is that if the train broke in two, the rear, independent, part of the train would have no brakes at all. But going downhill the rear end would run into the front end anyway so it wasn’t a problem.Some of us got to run trains on the BNSF simulator. While we were safely getting a train down the (original) 3 % at 25 mph the instructor said watch this. He released the dynamic and air brakes and the train took off like a rocket on the 3 %; he stopped it with the emergency braking. Then an engineer had a problem; he had no air left in the cars’ reservoirs, which meant no brakes. He could either have hand brakes set and then recharged the reservoirs, or he could leave the brakes on and run the train downhill using power against the set brakes.
The line over Kicking Horse Pass, before the spiral tunnels were put in, was something like a 4 percent grade. As I recall, going down toward the coast there were runaway tracks, and the switch was set for the runaway track by default. The engineer had to whistle an all clear before the switchman would set the switch for the main line. These days with radio and all, perhaps the runaway tracks should be put back in, either with direct radio control, or communication with a central dispatcher to have the switch aligned for the main. Just a thought.
Mister Fuller: If you have ever been in an all-out snowstorm in the Canadian Rockies you would know the answer to that question. As for the brakes, air brakes apply when the pressure in the line drops. The force to apply the brakes on each car comes from compressed air in a reservoir on that car … which means, over time tis pressure will leak off, and then the brakes will release. You can bring the pressure in the reservoirs up again, but that means bringing the pressure in the line up, which is interpreted as a signal to release the brakes. While a very good design, the Westinghouse air brake design does have this flaw, although it is usually not a problem. Other designs I have seen include a constant pressure line with electric actuation (loss of electrical power causes an application), but that design is not the North American standard. The usual rant, the usual disclaimer, and we now break for station identification on all network stations and most affiliates. Test, paragraph one.
Why would the applying of handbrakes be impossible? And if for some reason it was, the first crew should not have left the train unattended. No new air test rules are needed – just compliance with existing rules.
Anna, the new line has only a 2 % grade (the old line is now the highway). The problem with that runaway was that the crew had gone dead on the law in very severe weather, and the train sat for several hours before a replacement crew could arrive. The original crew had also reported braking problems (they may have had to use an emergency set to stop the train). By the time the replacement crew arrived and was on board the brakes had leaked off, and I believe the train started to roll before the new crew could do anything. It’s not known what the original crew told the new crew, if anything. The only thing that could have prevented the accident would have been to set hand brakes but in the very cold and windy weather that would have been almost impossible.