Repost from CBSNewYork [Editor: Even very slow-moving trains can become entangled in severe and unpredictable accidents. Imagine a collision like this in Benicia’s Industrial Park, with nearby businesses and oil storage tanks. – RS]
Tractor-Trailer Bursts Into Flames After Being Hit By Freight Train In Queens
By Janelle Burrell, July 8, 2015
NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) — The driver of a tractor-trailer is recovering after his truck burst into flames when it was hit by a slow-moving freight train carrying garbage in Queens.
It happened around 1 a.m. Wednesday on Rust Street near 57th Place in Maspeth.
Sources said the truck driver did not see the train approaching the intersection as the train’s operator, who was going about 15 miles per hour, tried to brake and blew his horn to alert the driver, CBS2’s Janelle Burrell reported.
But the train still ended up clipping the truck, dragging the cab a few hundred feet before it came to a stop and burst into flames.
The truck driver, from New Penn Trucking, managing to escape. Crews rushed him from the scene with minor injuries.
“It’s a surprise to me and it’s mind boggling, but I’m glad he walked away from it,” said co-worker Julius Hall. “I’m glad he walked away.”
The train operator walked away unhurt and has been interviewed by police.
The first railroad crossing warning gate was destroyed by the impact. Police say it’s not clear whether it had been working.
The other warning gate on the other side of the intersection appeared operational and was still in the down position when investigators arrived on scene.
CBS2 reached out to the railroad company, New York and Atlantic Railway, but they have not returned a request for comment.
A railcar tumbled from an overpass onto a Houston street Thursday, the latest in a rising number of derailments in Harris County, which is home to a network of rail corridors carrying an increasing volume of freight, including millions of gallons of hazardous cargo.
The two cars that plunged from a bridge spanning Old Katy Road near Washington Avenue around 8:30 a.m – one of which landed on the street – were carrying soybeans and plastic pellets and caused no injuries.
But between 2 million and 6 million gallons of crude oil and other hazardous chemicals travel through the county by rail each week, some of it on the same line, according to the Department of Public Safety.
And, although rail shipments of crude have declined along with the price recently, the practice still is drawing intense scrutiny after devastating derailments elsewhere and because, in Texas, crude rides the rails with little oversight.
Officials of Kansas City Southern Railway Company, which operated the 84-car train, said the train involved in Thursday’s derailment was en route from Beaumont to Kendleton with two crew members aboard when the cars derailed.
Company spokesman C. Doniele Carlson said nine to 11 cars jumped the tracks. The other derailed cars included automobile haulers as well as boxcars loaded with freight.
Traffic on Old Katy Road was detoured while authorities investigated the accident and brought in crews and equipment to lift the railcars back onto the tracks. Trains also had to avoid the area, forcing more freight to move along the eastern and western ends of Houston on other rail lines.
Although news images showing two locomotives led some to believe two trains had collided, only one was involved in the incident, said Jeff DeGraff, a spokesman for Union Pacific Railroad, which owns the tracks. No other trains were in the vicinity.
Investigators are trying to determine what led to the accident, DeGraff said.
Along with rail traffic – which has increased since 2009 but lately dipped because of a slowdown in oil exploration – collisions and derailments are increasing. Through March 31, the latest information available, railroads reported six collisions and six derailments in Harris County, according to Federal Railroad Administration data. In the first three months of 2014, only two collisions and two derailments were reported.
Many factors can lead to rail accidents, and federal data includes some incidents that would have virtually no effect outside day-to-day railroad operations, such as minor derailments in sorting yards where railcars are transferred.
According to federal reports, of the 26 rail incidents that did not involve a highway crossing in Harris County last year, 14 were caused by equipment factors such as flaws in the tracks, signal malfunctions and faulty railcar and locomotive parts. A dozen were caused by human error.
Prior maintenance and inspection of the 1,500-foot area of track where officials believe the derailment occurred did not indicate any flaws, DeGraff said. Tracks ties – the beams on which the track lies – were replaced two years ago.
Trains are expected to carry a growing amount of cargo to and from the Houston area. Based on a 2013 report by the Houston-Galveston Area Council, tonnage of rail shipments is predicted to climb from the 2007 level of 152 million tons to 218 million tons by 2035.
Much of that growth, slowed by the economic downturn from 2008 to 2011, has resumed. More frequent and longer trains are an increasingly common sight at some crossings.
Despite the increase, researchers and local officials said they were not concerned that more trains would lead to disastrous results. Railroads are investing hundreds of millions of dollars in projects meant to move the freight and improve track conditions.
“UP is making lots of money right now, and they are investing money in their track,” said Harris County Judge Ed Emmett, chairman of the Texas Freight Advisory Committee.
Last month, Union Pacific said it had projects totaling $383 million planned to start in 2015 in Texas alone. Among them is replacement of 178,000 railroad ties in Harris, Fort Bend, Montgomery and Walker counties and new rail on three routes, including from Loop 610 and Hardy Street to near the University of Houston campus.
BNSF, based in Fort Worth, plans $223 million worth of upgrades across Texas this year.
The investment is good business, said Allan Rutter, a division head of the Texas A&M University Transportation Institute’s freight mobility program.
“Track that isn’t carrying railcars isn’t very good,” Rutter said.
Unlike highways and public transit, which many argue are strained to handle the growth in population, jobs and goods movement, railroad tracks are owned and operated by private companies.
“They are not dependent on waiting for someone to give them money,” Rutter said, referring to the political process at the federal, state and local levels that must precede highway and transit expansion.
CN Rail grain train derails in Alberta, no injuries
Apr 10, 2015 1:58pm EDT
(Reuters) – Twenty-four grain cars on a Canadian National Railway train derailed in Alberta on Friday morning without injury or dangerous goods involved, Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) said.
The derailment on the 104-car train took place in a rural area south of Irricana, Alberta, 63 kilometers (39 miles) northeast of Calgary, at 10 a.m. local time (1600 GMT). CN Rail crews were responding and will investigate the incident, company spokesman Patrick Waldron said.
Separately on Friday, Canada’s Transportation Safety Board said it had launched an investigation into the death of a CN employee in a rail yard in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, on Thursday night.
CN Rail has suffered a spate of accidents in recent months, including a derailment of two crude-oil trains in the same area of northern Ontario within three weeks, raising the concern of government officials.
CN Rail’s safety record deteriorated sharply in 2014, reversing years of improvements, as accidents in Canada blamed on poor track conditions hit their highest level in more than five years, a Reuters analysis found. (Reporting by Susan Taylor; Editing by Franklin Paul; and Peter Galloway)
Train derailment near Cheney may block road until Saturday
By Mike Prager , January 16, 2015
Cars derailed where the tracks cross Cheney- Spokane Road in Cheney on Thursday. Jesse Tinsley photo
The rail line where a grain train jumped the tracks early Thursday has been targeted for major upgrades so it can safely handle today’s heavier locomotives and longer trains.
The derailment at Cheney-Spokane Road on the northeast side of Cheney left at least six cars off the track, including one that was tilting at a 20-degree angle.
The train was traveling slowly – no more than 10 mph – a crew worker said. No injuries were reported and no wheat was spilled.
Cheney-Spokane Road likely will be blocked until Saturday. After a contractor lifts the fully loaded grain hoppers back onto the rails, crews will fix damage to the rail line and crossing.
A detour is in place on a gravel section of Betz Road east of state Highway 904 and on a short section of Andrus Road.
The 30-car train derailed as it entered Cheney from Almira just before 1:30 a.m. Thursday on the state-owned short line.
Bob Westby, the state’s manager of the Palouse River & Coulee City Railroad line, said the state has been seeking funding to upgrade the track, ties and roadbed in the location where the derailment occurred.
Last year, the state asked the federal government for a $6 million TIGER grant (Transportation Investment Generating Economic Recovery) to upgrade the line from Cheney to the Geiger spur, a distance of just over 6 miles.
The grant was rejected, but it had to compete with nearly 800 other TIGER requests nationwide. It was one of three submitted by the state Department of Transportation.
“This project is one of our priorities,” Westby said.
The project is included in a $30 million budget request to the Legislature this session for rail needs. If approved, work on the line could begin later this year or next year.
The derailment underscores concerns about more frequent rail shipments, including potentially volatile crude oil traveling on mainline tracks.
John Taves, a Cheney city councilman, said the blockage of Cheney-Spokane Road would delay emergency vehicles and shows the risks facing the public from train accidents.
“People need to realize railroad traffic is increasing,” he said. “There has been a lot of concern.”
Bill Wolff, director of maintenance for the short line’s operator, said it was not clear what caused the derailment. He said cold weather puts stress on the track, making it vulnerable to fracture under a bad wheel, for example.
Once the line is cleared, inspectors can examine the track to determine a cause, Wolff said.
The state bought the line in 2004 to preserve rail access for rural communities in Eastern and Central Washington and to keep more truck traffic off state highways. At the time, state officials said $22 million in upgrades were needed.
The upgrades north of Cheney are requested in part so heavier BNSF Railway locomotives and 110-car trains can serve a new grain loader under construction north of Four Lakes. The new loader facility will have an “eight pack” concrete grain elevator, high-speed loading and a large circular staging track for filling the units. The elevator will be 190 feet tall.
The line, which dates to the late 1800s, is part of the former BNSF network in the region. The railroad sold the line in the mid-1990s to a private company, which then sold it to the state.
It’s operated under lease by the Eastern Washington Gateway Railroad.
The short line serves farm communities by hauling grain at favorable rates and industrial companies at Airway Heights. The 108-mile segment north and west of Cheney passes through Medical Lake, Reardan, Davenport, Creston, Wilbur, Almira, Hartline and Coulee City, the terminus.
Companion lines run south of Cheney and serve Rosalia, Oakesdale and points south, including a network of rail in the Palouse. The total track is 296 miles.
The derailment did not block access to shopping areas at Highway 904 and Cheney-Spokane Road. Roadblocks were set up ahead of the crossing in both directions.
