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Re: Yep that was in the rule book but I never saw it used....and it's still a bad practice.
Author: BOB2
Date: 02-07-2018 - 15:34
How many of these were you ever issued? Yeah, this is there, I've never seen that used.
We did have a major signal failure on Beaumont one long night back when I was working helpers in the early seventies, and we were given the dispatchers permission to stop and pass every A signal, and then were allowed run every ABS signal "at restricted speed", and this was a complete mess on the hill, including a knuckle or two as I recall. But, I've never been given that order.
It was an unsafe and obsolete rule then, and it is still now, if this is what resulted in an avoidable, very dangerous likelihood of setting this lethal trap.
If this train had been operating under restricted speed, we'd only be having a company investigation, and not likely an NTSB investigation, or coroners inquest, would we?
This rule, and exception, if that was in effect, just happened to result in a fatal head on into a standing train because of speed in excess of stopping distance. That could be from human failure, or could even be deliberate, we don't know, but the crew is just as dead.
But, what if they had only hit a 9 inch break in the rail at that speed and derailed, from winter cold contraction?
This rule, if it was in effect (or a similar exemption), from this resulting outcome, would appear to be a practice that is inherently dangerous and an unnecessary risk to both employees and passengers.
Back when I was a kid fireman, hot to run, the old hogger I was working for told me, "hell kid, any damn fool can run one of these things. But. what they pay us the really big money for, is being able to stop them".
I saw personally what happens when signals aren't working properly at El Monte, from human error creating a wrong signal indication, when I was on the first train past where Earl Nall bought it on the BSMFF.
I'll stick with the essentials: Being able to "stop short" of impending disaster "good", signals working to prevent such disasters "good" (that "new fangled" technology has even saved me had I been operating at that speed without them), and "flying blind" at this speed(in this day and age) a very-very "bad" practice, in my best professional opinion.
As I said, in my only SP experience with a major signal failure or outage, we flagged and ran those signals on Beaumont, at restricted speed, which is a bitc# and screws up everything. And, I don't recall anything like this happening with Sunset that night.
Maybe, there are a one or two bad rules like this one, that may have allowed this "observably" unsafe practice, that are maybe "written in blood", too.
We did have a major signal failure on Beaumont one long night back when I was working helpers in the early seventies, and we were given the dispatchers permission to stop and pass every A signal, and then were allowed run every ABS signal "at restricted speed", and this was a complete mess on the hill, including a knuckle or two as I recall. But, I've never been given that order.
It was an unsafe and obsolete rule then, and it is still now, if this is what resulted in an avoidable, very dangerous likelihood of setting this lethal trap.
If this train had been operating under restricted speed, we'd only be having a company investigation, and not likely an NTSB investigation, or coroners inquest, would we?
This rule, and exception, if that was in effect, just happened to result in a fatal head on into a standing train because of speed in excess of stopping distance. That could be from human failure, or could even be deliberate, we don't know, but the crew is just as dead.
But, what if they had only hit a 9 inch break in the rail at that speed and derailed, from winter cold contraction?
This rule, if it was in effect (or a similar exemption), from this resulting outcome, would appear to be a practice that is inherently dangerous and an unnecessary risk to both employees and passengers.
Back when I was a kid fireman, hot to run, the old hogger I was working for told me, "hell kid, any damn fool can run one of these things. But. what they pay us the really big money for, is being able to stop them".
I saw personally what happens when signals aren't working properly at El Monte, from human error creating a wrong signal indication, when I was on the first train past where Earl Nall bought it on the BSMFF.
I'll stick with the essentials: Being able to "stop short" of impending disaster "good", signals working to prevent such disasters "good" (that "new fangled" technology has even saved me had I been operating at that speed without them), and "flying blind" at this speed(in this day and age) a very-very "bad" practice, in my best professional opinion.
As I said, in my only SP experience with a major signal failure or outage, we flagged and ran those signals on Beaumont, at restricted speed, which is a bitc# and screws up everything. And, I don't recall anything like this happening with Sunset that night.
Maybe, there are a one or two bad rules like this one, that may have allowed this "observably" unsafe practice, that are maybe "written in blood", too.
