Derailments

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warmstrong1955
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Re: Derailments

Post by warmstrong1955 »

Sure. Automation. What could possibly go wrong.

Once upon a time, at a big mine in a small town in Arizona, Magma Copper, aka; the San Manuel Railroad, decided to automate their ore hauling. Early 70's, give or take.
Not a complex route. Fill up the cars at the mine, travel about 7 miles to the mill, dump.....and go back. Nothin' to it.
Seemed something glitched. Also seemed, that the engineer, was unable to whoa up the train. Instead of dumping & heading back to the mine, away it went to the end of the tracks. (Never buy an automated rail system from a peddler named Hal 9000)

The 'stop', in end-stop, is a misnomer. Or maybe, it's just a suggestion. Stopping is not involved. So, there went a perfectly good GP38 and an RS-3, off the end of the tracks, down the bank, and into a sand wash, along with a half a dozen now slightly bent ore cars.
Me & a friend were headed to the motocross track along the highway, and watched it happen. It was like slow motion. No one hurt thankfully. Kodak moment, but neither of us had a Kodak.

After the second similar but not quite as costly maneuver like the first one, they gave up, and went back to the old fashioned use of people. Not sure what happened to Hal, but I think he went to flippin' burgers at McDoDo's.
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Russ Hanscom
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Re: Derailments

Post by Russ Hanscom »

The local San Juan power plant did essentially the same thing; short run from the mine to the power plant. Ended up with part of the train in the pit.
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Greg_Lewis
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Re: Derailments

Post by Greg_Lewis »

There is a tram at, I think, San Francisco airport, that is fully automated. But it only runs a few hundred yards and there are no grade crossings or anything else to interfere. I think automated trains could be done. I think there is enough technology out there to make it work safely. But the goal of a railroad in America is to show a profit, and that's not compatible with what I think it would take to create automated trains with the level of safety that we would want to see.
Last edited by Greg_Lewis on Sat Mar 25, 2023 9:46 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Bill Shields
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Re: Derailments

Post by Bill Shields »

Ever ridden on the Airtrain (?) connector from Amtrak into Newark Liberty airport? Some maybe 3 miles I am guessing.

I first rode on it ...maybe 2004

There are no grade crossings, and it runs quite automatically....at least I have never seen an operator in the lead car.
Too many things going on to bother listing them.
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warmstrong1955
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Re: Derailments

Post by warmstrong1955 »

In 2008, an automated train at Miami Int'l Airport rolled in to unload passengers.....and kept on going right into a wall. A glitch?
While it happened, a maintenance worker was monitoring the train. Asleep at the keyboard?
If it's mechanical, and that includes electronics and everything else, at some point it will fail.
If the human element is involved, at some point the human element will fail.
Murphy's Laws always apply.
The reason you can't make something fool-proof, is because fools are so ingenious.
:)
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kcameron
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Re: Derailments

Post by kcameron »

Consider the elevator. In most places total automation. But as said, for total automation, lots of layers of safety and most cases forms of redundancy. Big point is all the reasons the elevator would not try to move. Only if everything lines up right, then it moves. If it does decide to stop, people are inconvenienced, but not hurt.

ABS signals were the same idea. If anything failed, it would cause a stop indication. That is one side of railway automation, if the system could always turn a fault into a stop, the crew to fix it might have a long drive to get there. But with aircraft, stopping and sitting isn't an option. I always think of an airplane as like a boat, but that boat sinks if the engines stop.

I've ridden lots of airplanes with a single pilot. But I only cared about getting to altitude. I wasn't planning on landing with the plane. If we got to 1000 feet, I could take care of myself.
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Wolfgang
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Re: Derailments

Post by Wolfgang »

Go to youtube and look for H-tains in Dortmund and Duesseldorf Germany. Wuppertal is the granddaddy of them all.

In my neck-of-the-woods the powers-that-be are spending $2 Billion on a new transit system using a rail system that was torn up 70 years ago. During the construction, which is still not complete, many small businesses went bankrupt due to lack of access to the store.

The more things change the more they stay the same, or get worse.
hoppercar
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Re: Derailments

Post by hoppercar »

And now another serious one in Minnesota with burning ethanol tankers...I definitely get the impression that these big corporations are only concerned with profit....damn the torpedos and full speed ahead
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Bill Shields
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Re: Derailments

Post by Bill Shields »

Better burn that ethanol before people realize they can drink it.

Not sure how bad a pollutant ethanol is out in the open..
Too many things going on to bother listing them.
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Steggy
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Re: Derailments

Post by Steggy »

Bill Shields wrote: Fri Mar 31, 2023 7:10 pmBetter burn that ethanol before people realize they can drink it.
Hillbillies have bathtub gin and railroaders have tanker tequila. :D

Ethanol not intended for human consumption is usually denatured during production. You’d end up blind drunk if you swallowed what is in those tankers. :twisted:

Not sure how bad a pollutant ethanol is out in the open.
It can be damaging to wildlife that ingests it, same as it would be damaging to a person in sufficient quantity. Since it evaporates quickly, it’s nothing like “forever” chemicals, such as vinyl chloride. Ethanol combustion produces mostly carbon dioxide and water, with a small amount of aldehydes, the latter potentially an atmospheric pollutant.

Ethanol is naturally produced from decaying plant matter, so it could be argued it is not a true pollutant. Of course, the quantity that is produced by a rotting weed is tiny compared to what gets dumped out of a tank car during a wreck. :shock:

Incidentally, it isn’t practical to transport ethanol via pipelines due to water absorption. Ethanol intended for motor fuel has to be kept as anhydrous as possible, especially when used in cold climates. Rail remains the best way to transport large quantities of ethanol.
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hoppercar
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Re: Derailments

Post by hoppercar »

Norfolk southern is just like the rest of corporate America.....they are obsessed with with making as much profit as they can , and fattening up there shareholders, who are already obscenely rich....they constantly cut back, layoff, eliminate jobs, and are poor on track maintenance....there bank roll is so fat, that a few serious derailments, fines and lawsuits, are cheaper than labor and maintenance......
Pontiacguy1
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Re: Derailments

Post by Pontiacguy1 »

I am getting really tired of the "corporate America" bashing on this board. Take to to CNN or FOX or whatever.
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