by fl9m2004
Thanks for information
Hopefully it will make up time between Springfield and New Haven
Hopefully it will make up time between Springfield and New Haven
MBTA F40PH-2C 1050 wrote:electricron wrote:But that is the job of local law enforcement and rescue crews, check up/rescue on situations in any kind of terrain. Got to remember that there are passengers of all ages on this train. MBTA has had to save/transfer Amtrak psgr's to our equipment and visa versa up here in MA/RI, and those kind of transfers can take almost 2 hours to complete depending on what the exact situation is, and is a last resort if rescue power can't be readied quickly enough. I don't know the territory down there, 1 or 2 main trks, but sounds like there was no rescue engine, or possibly no rescue crew available to man the rescue unit. I agree with your idea to uncouple and drag back the good half of the train, but obviously there was a variable that forced Amtrak not able to do that move. I'm assuming as well that this is CSX dispatched territory?? A rescue train can not just be summoned, and travel over CSX without proper paperwork and release forms, that takes time. Railroading is tough sometimes, it is easy to say "well why didn't they do this??" Most of the time, the easiest solution can't be doneMBTA F40PH-2C 1050 wrote:They could have uncoupled the car with the brake problems from the front half of the train and taken those passengers in those cars to the station and come back using track 2 and coupled onto the cars in the last half of the train and taken them to the station, leaving the problem car at the scene. I'm not suggesting that's the only thing they could do, but it is one they could have done without placing passengers at risk. Per the news article I linked, deputy sheriffs had no problems reaching the train, so passengers shouldn't have had more problems reaching the same road or street where they parked their patrol cars, and could have risen a bus to the station. I'll admit that alternate may have placed passengers at risk, but not more so than the deputy sheriffs.electricron wrote: I would simply state a 13 to 14 hour delay is one huge major delay....And how would they accommodate these passengers to Richmond? I'm going to assume, you mean bring them to the nearest station? Walk them back 2 miles to the station on the trap rock and track structure??? When situations like this arise, Conductors and A.C.'s can not just empty a train, and walk psgr's back a mile to a station, it is unsafe and could be very dangerous, especially at dusk. I'm sure the crew didn't think it would be that long to get back underway, but communication sometimes takes a while to get a plan in place in the RR, TM's got to take to Chief TD's and then talk to the next person.......a wise, fatherly figure engineer taught me the greatest piece of knowledge since I have been on the RR..."take it slow, because when you rush, that is when sh*t happens and everything hits the fan"
How difficult would it had been for Amtrak to accommodate these passengers at the Richmond train station just two miles away?
What the news article failed at was describing what Amtrak did to fix the damaged brakes and wheels for the problem car? Did Amtrak repair it where it was, replace the brakes, replace the car, etc?
I missed this. The variable is if you uncoupled the portion of the train south of the diner and ran away with it, what happens to the passengers that are in the cars north of the crippled diner? They are now stuck and without HEP since you took the engines. That's not a big issue if you could come up behind them with another engine, grab them and shove to RVR...which was the original plan. However, when you're holding a main on one of the busiest corridors in the east which is causing single track conditions, and the host railroad has a quite a few trains to run and can't commit to running a light engine and then shoving passengers on the only track left, that is a serious variable.
So, they made temporary repairs at the scene.