Freight train fire causes delays on Providence commuter rail

[Teamdriver]

News Item June 13 2017

The MBTA’s Providence commuter rail line is facing delays during the commute Tuesday morning after material in a freight train caught fire in Mansfield, officials said.

Mansfield police officers were dispatched to the tracks around 4:33 a.m. Tuesday where they saw flames coming from a one car on the freight train using the Amtrak tracks.

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[litz]

Looks like the catenary wire is on fire, too ...

[BandA]

is this a trash train? or construction debris? I'd be concerned with the effluent runoff from the water used to put out the fire. I'd be worried about the catenery melting or being weakened, I assume Amtrak inspected & said it was okay.

So, the debris "spontaneously combusted", or somebody threw a cigarette, broken glass worked as a magnifying lens, or wheels overheated/sparked.

[dbperry]

C&D from Brockton.

From my post on U-hub (http://www.universalhub.com/2017/dumpst ... ent-606278" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;)

The primary sources for C&D in railcars that we're talking about here are two facilities in Brockton MA:
Trojan (71 Forest Street)
Champion (138 Wilder Street)
You can zoom in on Google Maps to see the freight cars spotted at those businesses.

How do C&D cars end up in Mansfield? This is where it gets fun.

Anyway, after being loaded, our C&D cars from Brockton go like this:
Brockton -> Middleboro
Middleboro -> Attleboro
Attleboro -> Mansfield (THIS IS THE 7 mile section where they run on the Northeast Corridor / Providence MBTA line)
Mansfield -> Framingham
Framingham -> Selkirk / Albany NY

[BostonUrbEx]

So, the debris "spontaneously combusted", or somebody threw a cigarette, broken glass worked as a magnifying lens, or wheels overheated/sparked.

Loaded too high and either touched the catenary wire or the wire arced into the too-high debris.

[GP40MC1118]

Those cars are from Trojan Recycling Cambello section of Brockton. No C&D.
Something got in all that metal to start a fire...

D

[dieciduej]

So, the debris "spontaneously combusted", or somebody threw a cigarette, broken glass worked as a magnifying lens, or wheels overheated/sparked.

Loaded too high and either touched the catenary wire or the wire arced into the too-high debris.

Usually they are a little more careful with the height, since it is traveling on the NEC. You piss off Amtrak and you'll find yourself taking the long way around.

But if it was just trash, during a couple of days of 90+ weather, sometimes it will spontaneously combust. I've seen security tapes at work of a dumpster going up without any help.

JoeD

[F-line to Dudley via Park]

So, the debris "spontaneously combusted", or somebody threw a cigarette, broken glass worked as a magnifying lens, or wheels overheated/sparked.

Loaded too high and either touched the catenary wire or the wire arced into the too-high debris.

Not likely to have played a role. The NEC's cleared for Plate F between Mansfield Jct. and Attleboro Jct., so the wires will clear a CSX-standard hi-roof boxcar just fine. These were open-top hoppers, which are up to 1-2 ft. shorter than their largest capacity covered-hoppers, which are a few inches shorter than an MBTA K-car. That's a solid 4-1/2 ft. below wire height on this section of NEC, and as the photos show the cars clearly weren't overtopped.

If the wire caught anything it was probably some piece of flaming debris that flew up in the wind...but that's as much of a hazard as when a diesel loco's stack upchucks a 'hairball' of carbon that ignites on the wire or an electric jettisons a smoky chunk of its carbon pantograph contact surface. It's unrelated to the main problem under investigation: i.e. how/why the C&D material ignited in the hoppers. Even as an overnight job returning to Framingham in the wee hours, a couple days of accumulated abnormal heat will make dry debris smolder and spontaneously combust. I stamped out a small peat fire with my sneakers around a freshly landscaped tree in a city park yesterday; that stuff's been going up like matchsticks all week. C&D's got lots of crap with similar combustibility in these weather conditions. They could find the freight customer at fault for not hosing down its loads with a spray of water as a precaution, but that's not necessarily going to close the loophole airtight on something spontaneously going up on pure chance. Tis the season for that.

[BostonUrbEx]

Not likely to have played a role.

That was the official report. Even more surprisingly, it has happened before.

[BandA]

Someone smoking at the recycling company, tosses a butt, perhaps.

[atlantis]

Now I know why delays on the "T" really burn you up!

[bunky]

Those cars are from Trojan Recycling Cambello section of Brockton. No C&D.
Something got in all that metal to start a fire...

D

Trojan is a C+D facility unless something has changed since the last time I was in the place.

[Ken W2KB]

Looks like the catenary wire is on fire, too ...

It appears that the smoke/soot from the fire deposited itself onto the surface of the catenary insulator. Soot/smoke can be conductive and it appears in the photo that there is an electrical arc crossing the insulators.

Common practice in the electric utility industry is to de-energize (shut off) transmission lines where there is a forest/brush fire under or adjacent to the line for this very reason.

[MBTA F40PH-2C 1050]

Those GP40-2's throw some good sparks, another possible start to the blaze, accompanied by the heat that week. The train itself was B725