Re: union pacific derailment
Author: Northern Snowman
Date: 07-30-2010 - 17:37
John McGaugh Wrote:
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> Yes I did check the Baker city news and also the
> Ontario news as well as the UP news and train
> news. I was curious as to the cause and why all
> the cars was stacked up in one location. The
> derailment looked more like a head on than a
> derailment while being pulled up the grade.
> Thanks, John
When you are dealing with heavy loads and especially a train consisting entirely of heavy loaded cars, small derailments turn big fast even at slow speeds. Heavy things don't stop fast and they have a tendency to push and plow through anything in their way. Throw in a distributed power unit pushing and stuff will really pile up. Even though locomotives drop their load when they go into emergency, it takes a few seconds for the emergency application to be passed through each car to reach them.