Nostalgia & History > Missing Your Trainorders

I always wondered what would happen if the head end crew missed its trainorders. You approach the station, the guys holds up the loop, you reach out but its not far enough and oops you missed.
What would you do. Or you hold your arm out to get your orders and then SMACK, your arm hits the loop and shatters the stick. I bet that would hurt.

I am under the impression they are supposed to stop and someone from the headend crew was to walk back and get the orders.

They have to stop and retrieve the orders. When I was working on the N&W it only happened to me once. I was working PE Tower (Painesville, OH) and luckily the train was heading into the siding so he was going slow enough that I only had to run about 10 car lengths to get him the orders. Also, there was a very understanding dispatcher working that day, Roy McCormack, Doyle's father.

John Benson

http://www.bensonrailphotos.com

I saw this happen in Yermo (Ca.) to Amtrak. When I was forced to Yermo in 1978, the westbound Amtrak (can't remember the number now) would come through and of course didn't stop in Yermo, but had to get Santa Fe track warrants before going on the Needles sub at Daggett. The clerk or agent at Yermo would hand up the orders on the fly in front of the old Yermo Depot. One night as they were coming through, the head end missed the orders and had to stop the train. The clerk then jumped in his car and drove the orders up to the head end.-BMT

stretch Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I always wondered what would happen if the head
> end crew missed its trainorders. You approach the
> station, the guys holds up the loop, you reach out
> but its not far enough and oops you missed.
> What would you do. Or you hold your arm out to
> get your orders and then SMACK, your arm hits the
> loop and shatters the stick. I bet that would
> hurt.

As has been posted, according to the rule book, they are
supposed to stop and get the orders.

I remember one occasion working as the operator at Troutdale, OR
on the UP Oregon Division in 1970-72. Our hottest EB train, the SPX,
powered by Centennials, almost always had orders to pick up while
roaring by at 65 MPH.

One day the orders popped off the fireman's arm and fell to the ground.
The rear end got the orders OK. The head end called the conductor on the
radio: "What'd them orders say?"

They didn't stop.

I have seen a number of misses, but I have never seen a hoop shatter.
Generally, stations where orders were picked up at high speed had a
fixed transmitter to which the order forks were mounted, rather than
hand-held hoops.

Using a fixed order transmitter, I once saw the hoops put in backward.
It must have hurt to get those orders, the clips were bent off the forks.

Best regards,

Rob L.

rob_l Wrote:
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> Using a fixed order transmitter, I once saw the
> hoops put in backward.
> It must have hurt to get those orders, the clips
> were bent off the forks.
>
> Best regards,
>
> Rob L.

I had an operator do this to me one time and even though the string broke I still had a pretty good welt even through my long sleeved shirt - OW!!!

Depended who you were pulling. If it was an old head who knew his stuff, you would call him on the radio. If not, you would stop and back up and get them.

King City & Surf were 70 MPH pick ups. If you had a covered wagon on the point, you had to open up the door and lean out. No time to crank the window down.

When we used to pick up and set out cars for the LAs at San Ardo, you would pick up the bills on the head end on the fly at King City. Well one night the operator hung the hoop up backwards and it about took Frank Jackson's arm off. Not to mention way bills from hell to breakfast from the depot all the way to the Carrot sheds.

THE CLIP FACES THE ONCOMING TRAIN, so the string can pull out and around the bracket.


Nudge

spnudge Wrote:
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> Depended who you were pulling. If it was an old
> head who knew his stuff, you would call him on the
> radio. If not, you would stop and back up and get
> them.
>
> King City & Surf were 70 MPH pick ups. If you had
> a covered wagon on the point, you had to open up
> the door and lean out. No time to crank the window
> down.
>
> When we used to pick up and set out cars for the
> LAs at San Ardo, you would pick up the bills on
> the head end on the fly at King City. Well one
> night the operator hung the hoop up backwards and
> it about took Frank Jackson's arm off. Not to
> mention way bills from hell to breakfast from the
> depot all the way to the Carrot sheds.
>
> THE CLIP FACES THE ONCOMING TRAIN, so the string
> can pull out and around the bracket.
>
>
> Nudge

Thanks for a blast from the past. :)

You don't want to admit to missing them, if you do.

I was a new-hire on the extra board, working a transfer job with a bunch of very old heads (as you'd expect with a four-hour quit nearly every day). I was on the head end where I could do the most work and the least damage. Got the orders from the operator at the crossing tower. A few carlengths later we got a very terse message from the conductor in the waycar: "Stop". No ID, just voice recognition. The engineer brought our little train to a stop (on 10-mph track, that wasn't too hard or too far). Two minutes later: "Go." Engineer told me, "Missed the orders again."

This was a few decades ago--the job, the tower operators, train orders, and much of the trackage in question (and probably those old heads and the motive power)is no longer there.

A couple of embarrassing incidents come to mind. I was firing the southbound Coast Starlight between Oakland and San Luis Obispo on the SP (it wasn't called StarLATE back then!), numbered #12 south of Oakland at the time. We had a student fireman with us and I was explaining to him how to grab the orders and why you didn't want to miss them and delay a passenger train. We had to pick up orders at Watsonville Jct., were only going about 15 MPH and....you guessed it...I reached out and missed the orders! Fortunately at 15 MPH, it didn't take long for the engineer to stop the train and I ran back for them. He never let me forget that day though!

A couple of years earlier, on one of my own student fireman trips I was making my only trip between Los Angeles and San Luis Obispo, on a freight train. We were going about 60 MPH in the middle of the night and the engineer Vince "Nervine" Pando suddenly shouted "Red order board!" I looked ahead but didn't see any sort of signal or order post on my side. I opened the window and put out my arm in a hook, hoping for luck wherever that damn thing was...and of course I missed the orders. The speed and my watering eyes with my head out the window didn't help. I thought Vince was going to have a heart attack until the head brakeman who had been on the second unit and caught the orders that the rookie missed came through the engine room door.

>What would you do.

Well, it's never happened to me 3 times, and I didn't have to run back to get them three times . . .

johnw Wrote:
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> We were going about 60 MPH in the
> middle of the night and the engineer Vince
> "Nervine" Pando suddenly shouted "Green order
> board!" I looked ahead but didn't see any sort of
> signal or order post on my side.

If it was a green order board, you wouldn't find any orders
to pick up. Perhaps you meant red order board (SP or UP).

If it were Hill Lines, CB&Q, CRIP or Milw, you would have yellow
order board (19 orders) to pick up on the fly or a red order
board (31 orders) requiring you to stop and sign for the orders.

Best regrds,

Rob L.

I remember reading a story I believe in Trains magazine a number of years ago about the head end missing the orders and the old conductor said something like hang on for a few minutes. When he knew that the caboose had passed the station, he called out over the radio "Hey soandso the damb engine just lurched and I dumped coffee all over the orders. Read them to me will you!"

rob_l Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> johnw Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > We were going about 60 MPH in the
> > middle of the night and the engineer Vince
> > "Nervine" Pando suddenly shouted "Green order
> > board!" I looked ahead but didn't see any sort
> of
> > signal or order post on my side.
>
> If it was a green order board, you wouldn't find
> any orders
> to pick up. Perhaps you meant red order board (SP
> or UP).

Oops! You are so right Rob....I must have been having a "senior moment"! It was indeed a RED order board (wherever that sucker was!), although even a green board would have rattled Vince I think! Thanks for that correction!

JWR

Two of my most embarassing times when I was a fireman the first time, and an RFE the second time.

The first time was when I was a new fireman but was running the engine. We had two GP9s behind the cab of a train leaving Colton going up the cutoff, and the engineer, Howard Pergler, the same guy that overlooked an order to meet a guy at Canyon in 1977 and ran head on into him, kept telling me not to forget to pickup the orders as we went by the Colton yard office that the operator, Pat Smith, had hung for us. Well, like I said, I was the new guy and a few of the switchmen I had worked with just a few months before saw me running the engine and waved to me and I waved back. But, as usual, I went right by the hanging orders having forgot all about them because I was too busy waving at somebody. Pergler was furious! He told the head end to stop as the FIREMAN had missed the orders. Fortunately, we were only doing 15 mph as that was the speed up the east leg of the wye into Slover so it didn't take long to stop. But I think the most embarassing part was that Pergler made me walk back and get the orders which was my responsibility. I was mortified!

The second time was when I was an RFE out of LA and was on #375 coming out of Harold on the Saugus Line heading for Palmdale and was running the engine. You always picked up orders at Palmdale. We were coming up to the order hoop and the engineer told me not to forget the orders. Of course the event at Colton back in 1969 stuck in my head when I was a fireman and missed the orders at Colton. So, approaching the orders at Palmdale at 50 mph, I stuck my hand out to grab the orders. I got the orders okay but my mistake was that I did not make a fist to pick them up. I just had all of my fingers pointed to be sure that my hand went through the triangler shaped string that held the orders. You have no idea what pain is until your fingers hits that wooden dowel at 50 mph. I thought I was going to die and it felt like all of my fingers, save my thumb, were going to fall off from the pain. But, at least I did pick up the orders this time and didn't miss them. The engineer (was it Don Senior?) was laughing his butt off and he knew exactly how it felt to have your fingers hit the little 1/2 inch dowel that held the string that held the orders. I never did that again and learned to make a fist when picking orders up at speed. Your knuckles might hit the dowel but your fingers won't hurt to the point to where they feel like they are going to fall off. I learned my lesson real quick.

JDE

Best story I've heard -

A Conrail tower in the northeast during the late 1970's had a regular group of fans and photographers who hung around the vicinity. A local custom arose among some crewmembers where they'd 'clean out' the cab and caboose and toss old trainorders and paperwork to the assembled fans (most eastbound trains passed through a division still dispatched with orders).

One afternoon as the rear end of a train was approaching, a fan who was positioned a little too close to the tower began waving to the flagman on the caboose, using a set of old orders, essentially soliciting the flagman to toss off some paperwork. The flagman, however, thought the fan was the towerman, and that the head end must have missed picking up their orders.

The flagman dumped the air on the train, then hurried back to the 'towerman' and asked "you have orders for me?". The fan replied "no, do you have any for me?".

Fan-crew relations were a little strained after that...

As a Train Order Operator and Interlocking Tower Operator at locations that handled train orders prior to DTC there were other ways to make it easier for crews picking up orders on the fly.
I would always fold the orders in a manner so the address on the clearance was facing outwards so that would be the first thing the engineer/fireman/head brakeman would see. It was always incumbent on the crewman to check train I D, date and for any irregularities in the orders as soon as possible. Crews were tested regularly by being instructed to give them an invalid clearance or an order with wrong date, maybe engine number. It was a sinking feeling to the operator to watch them pick the orders up at speed and suddenly hearing the brakes being applied. You could expect a call on the radio.....A good head engineer might say something along the lines of ""Hey Fruitvale, my copy is a little smudged what engine number is that on the clearance??" Of course you would respond with...My copy has the Extra 4003 East, Over".....And we would get away with one.........I also covered a few times for them upon dropping or completely missing the orders. I made numerous trips out to Elmhurst to meet trains that missed orders at Fruitvale. If it was a local like the Jack-Rabbit I would run down and add a second set to the conductors and keep them moving. And yes....I will confess to turning the clips wrong for a favorite engineer of mine......I also stapled the string to the order sticks just for emphasis.....Ah, that was enjoyable railroading, family railroading, and despite our little fun here and there, responsible railroading.
A good Train Dispatcher, a few good train order operators and good crews were a joy to behold in what they did and I am very glad I was a part of that era. They have made railroading so sterile now that there is very little joy or pride in what people do now.