Video & Multimedia

mahatmakanejeeves

(57,393 posts) Tue Mar 28, 2017, 01:08 PM Mar 2017

NTSB releases dashcam videos of December 30, 2013, Casselton, North Dakota, oil train derailment

The first video is from a westbound grain train. It starts out with the westbound train going 36 mph. Then the train starts to slow down. One of the cars has derailed, and the brakes have gone on automatically.

Ordinarily, this wouldn't be much of a problem. Except, coming from the west is an oil train. The derailed car in the westbound train has spilled onto the track occupied by the eastbound oil train. The oil train's lead unit derails, and some of its train follows.

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NTSB releases dashcam videos of December 30, 2013, Casselton, North Dakota, oil train derailment (Original Post) mahatmakanejeeves Mar 2017 OP

Hard to believe.... Historic NY Mar 2017 #1

Grain train never notified anyone, the oil train thought it was just grain and not a car on the LiberalArkie Mar 2017 #2

Well that is forward thinking. DK504 Mar 2017 #3

"Most trains were at a dead stop long before another train came into view." mahatmakanejeeves Mar 2017 #4

Historic NY

(37,449 posts)

1. Hard to believe....

Reply to mahatmakanejeeves (Original post)

Tue Mar 28, 2017, 01:48 PM

Mar 2017

they didn't put the oil train into an emergency stop when they knew the other train was in trouble.

LiberalArkie

(15,713 posts)

2. Grain train never notified anyone, the oil train thought it was just grain and not a car on the

Reply to Historic NY (Reply #1)

Tue Mar 28, 2017, 02:44 PM

Mar 2017

tracks. Not a peep seemed to be heard until the oil train asked about it.

DK504

(3,847 posts)

3. Well that is forward thinking.

Reply to LiberalArkie (Reply #2)

Tue Mar 28, 2017, 03:33 PM

Mar 2017

I've always wondered why train tracks are so close together. We travelled by train for years, seems there was better communication back in the old days. Most trains were at a dead stop long before another train came into view.

Have they loosened the regulations more than back in the day?

So the First Nations were just misguided right? THIS is why oil needs to be rejected by Americans. Disgusting. The American gov't. continues to spit on the the First Nations and the second they say no the government and corporations are allowed to hire a mercenary group to keep them off their land. This is disgraceful.

mahatmakanejeeves

(57,393 posts)

4. "Most trains were at a dead stop long before another train came into view."

Reply to DK504 (Reply #3)

Tue Mar 28, 2017, 04:27 PM

Mar 2017

The spacing of railroad tracks is based on consensus standards, probably set by the American Railway Engineering and Maintenance-of-Way Association and maybe some civil engineering associations.

The American Railway Engineering and Maintenance-of-Way Association (AREMA) is a North American railway industry group. It publishes recommended practices for the design, construction and maintenance of railway infrastructure, which are requirements in the United States and Canada.

I'm pretty sure that trains have been meeting each other for, oh, about 170 years, give or take. I mean, at speed, on more than one track.

You have a lot of trains; you need a lot of tracks:

Okay, so it doesn't always go according to plan:

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