Western Railroad Discussion > BNSF Accident Photos

Unbelievable pictures that are hard to look at.

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More photos.

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pray for the families of the two crewman that died in this accident. also pray for the responders and crew that hadto extricate the traincrew from that led SD70--- most likely a grime job.
Regards

Q-GP30

This is a train crews worse nightmare come true. After years on the job I sometimes think thank God I got out alive and seeing these pictures really drives that thought home. This is so sad .....

Where and when was this accident? Was there a post on this forum about it? Very sad...



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 04/20/11 08:10 by a737flyer.

http://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?1,2445256

This is the link to the discussion on the accident.

Is this signaled or dark territory ?

camelot7unplugged Wrote:
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> Is this signaled or dark territory ?

It's ABS.BNSF Chicago-Omaha main.

CTC on the Creston Sub.

Dear God. Did I read correctly that this was a 15mph impact? Incredible lesson in momentum physics.

Am I the only one to see a very serious design flaw with the EMD Isolated cab?

AfroRon Wrote:
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> Am I the only one to see a very serious design
> flaw with the EMD Isolated cab?


You have got to be kidding...

Why would he be kidding, they are suppose to have anti-climbers on them, what happened. I understand 89 foot flats are lite and tend to pop up if hit hard enough, but this was a bit extreme, maybe EMD should look at cab design and reevaluate it for the safety of the crew. It's absolutely awful what happened with the loss of life, and if EMD can help redesign the anticlimbers to help prevent this from happening again, then at least a little, and I mean little good has come out of this. God bless the souls of our fallen union brother and sister.
Q122 out

The cab design would not have made a difference. In a collision, one train is going to climb and end up in the cab of the other. I can't predict which will do that, but it seems to be the train that is hit is the one that climbs. The Gold Coast hitting the Colton-Kaiser Local in El Monte, CA was an example long before the new cab design came into being. The lead unit of the C-K Local climbed into the cab of the Coast, killing the head-end crew.

pecosvalleychief Wrote:
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> Dear God. Did I read correctly that this was a
> 15mph impact? Incredible lesson in momentum
> physics.

It's such a horrific event. My heart goes out to their families and colleagues. It's been a very tough four weeks for BNSF TY&E folks on the Creston and Seattle subs.

Not trying to stir the pot, but rather seeking clarification re: the above from pecosvalleychief: At 15 mph, wouldn't the crew have had time to bail out, even with the curve limiting vision?

That is assuming the crew was alert. I'm still awaiting the conclusion

Don't u hate Monday morning quarterbacks. If u look closely that EMD motor design is just fine. With maybe a 100 loaded coal cars behind it, it still stayed on the rails. Also the 1st flat cars hit the anti-climb & the other cars topedoed over the 1st flat car like a ramp. And i think the reason the crew didn't jump was because this happen and a curve. At 15 mph was all that tonnage, was like throwing a tomato at a brick wall. The alerter & the cab noise inside those SD70ACe's tells me the crew was wide awake. This is the opinion of a conductor with 27 years of railroading, not just another foamer!

The rumor out here (Vancouver WA) is they were supposed to be at restricted speed. We just had the accident in Lonview now this. We are sending a few cards around the depot out here for the guys to sign. As far as the cab design the way those cars hit looks like it was just right. Either way the families etc are in our thoughts and prayers at BNSF in Vancouver WA. Just an engineers 2 cents...

Take a look at the bottom flat car, the thing has buckled which could have caused the anti-climber to be compromised. Has anyone seen a flat car bend at that point before?

AfroRon Wrote:
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> Am I the only one to see a very serious design
> flaw with the EMD Isolated cab?

I was wondering about that myself. If you notice in the first pic in this thread, the bottom of the 'isolated' part of the cab is at a 90 degree angle to the frame of the engine, looking like the flat(s) 'broke' the cab off the mounts pushing the top half or so of the cab into the electrical cabinet. I think a non Quiet Cab(which is what these are now called by EMD) SD70ACe/M-2 might have faired better, not that I'm any kind of crash expert(I'm not an armchair quarterback either!).



spinecar Wrote:
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>The alerter & the cab noise inside those SD70ACe's tells me the crew was wide awake.

Maybe awake, but not necessarily WIDE awake. Trust me, you can still nod off operating these loud a$$ units!



CN_Hogger