We now have new details about the April train collision in Folkston, Georgia. Follow me on social media! Instagram: v12producti... Twitter: v12productions?la... Flickr: www.flickr.com/photos/v12prod... #railway #trains #news
Thank you for this information on the CSX incident in Folkston, Georgia in April! I am looking forward to any updates that you can give us in the future.
This could of been completely prevented. They had a inexperience conductor controlling the switch. The guy had less than one year of service. It should had been a MTO with him.
You have an outstanding channel and I have learned a lot from your videos. I retired about four years ago and got into railfanning. I live in Decatur, Alabama and have both NS and CSX trains. Thank you.
There was a signal suspension, PTC was cut out and trains were running on block authority. The Restricted Speed rule was added AFTER this incident. At the time of the incident the crew simply had to contact the "switch tender", who is the conductor on the ground assigned the responsibility of lining and locking the switches for the movement of the trains coming through that location. The crew contacted the switch tender. He told they were lined up correctly. When a switch is removed from power to hand throw, sometimes the handle has to be thrown back and forth before it engages and allows you to actually move the switch points. The inexperienced conductor took it off power and put it in hand throw and threw the switch lever but did not ensure that the switch points changed direction. Maximum speed during this signal suspension was 40mph not including any other temporary speed restrictions, of course. The train came through and all the bad sh*t happened. The railroad is squarely to blame for this. First, in the past, we ALWAYS had a transportation supervisor present. ALWAYS. The switch tender screwed up but the lackadaisical culture is thick with the railroad. It started with Hunter and continues to this day. Their chickens have come home to roost.
When I moved from MOW to environmental cleanup of a nuclear site, the training in human error and error precursors went from every 5 years to a yearly recertification in every aspect of error prevention. The world of railroading is just as dangerous as dealing with nuclear waste, but the safety emphasis is very different. I think that this is because railroading is so much older than the nuke industry and nuclear operations rules were developed mostly by the Nuclear Navy of Admiral Rickover. Civilian nuclear operations are nearly all run by Navy veterans or people from the Department of Energy who were trained by Navy veterans. The railroads need to run their safety training the same way. Industrial Safety Officers should be at least as common as Division Supervisors and Road Foremen of Engines.
@@allenra530the railroad doesn’t want to pay for safety before it happens. They’d rather pay for it after it happens. Somehow the bean counters have managed to tell the higher ups this will save them money.
If your assumption were to be correct, ONLY the one train would have been involved and thus would have simply "split" an incorrectly thrown/partially open switchblade, with just the ONE TRAIN involved. This had absolutely nothing to do with a switch, which WAS correctly aligned for turning out the East bound train. The 100% problem, was that the West bound (on his own) engineer, simply disregarded the stop/red signal and idled through hitting the side of the East bound (who was actually doing nothing wrong, as the Eastbound had right of possession of the turnout. The westboundSHOULD have been stopped AND REMAINED STATIONARY at the red. but, idled througfh, possibly with the engineer completely ignorant, out of his seat, doing something else, or catching 40 winks, had his eyes shut. He - is the only one who did NOT do what he was supposed to do. WAIT at the signal, without moving.
@@outdoorfrenzy The "railroad" can't fix stupid, any more than it can, if the ptc is switched out for shunting and NOT reactivated before moving off, along the main. IF THE PTC HAD BEEN REENGAGED, THE TRAIN WOULD HAVE AUOMATICALLY REMAINED AT THAT RED SIGNAL. SADLY ONLY THE "ON HIS OWN" WESTBOUND ENGINEER WAS AT FAULT. Not the engine, not the signals, not the switch and not the track.
Thanks for the update. Glad that none of the injuries were life threatening. My theory is (and I may be wrong) is either the switch Tender didn’t line the switch properly, or a miscommunication between the dispatcher and the crew. Or the train crew had a lack of situational awareness. We shall see.
My take from what's so far known is the crew were speeding. They were doing 13MPH faster than their own regulations require in this situation. The maximum speed allowed was 15MPH but they were doing 28MPH, so they couldn't stop in time for the misaligned points which the regs pre-empted may occur in this situation. However reading Motorman464 comment (below), it seems they were allowed to 40MPH and it wasn't their fault at all LOL.
You both are clueless. Quit spreading stuff that you have ZERO knowledge of. They were not speeding and it definitely wasn’t “lack of crew situation awareness”
My theory is this, the engineer of westboynd, left on jis own, decided to ease west, to be where the conductor would meet, before they arrived, but as he'd incorrectly NOT re-engaged drrive mode (PTC ON) simply set gis loco into "crawl at maybe 1 or 2 notches, then simply went to sleep, as you tend to do, on one's own (mo one looking) and so - boomph, didn't wake until the train collided with something and OH Sh&t - too late so blamed the PTC.
Track authoritys are also common in 171 territory or dark territory as its known. If you've been on the savannah side of macon its almost completely dark territory except for a few spots around savannah
Great video as always, glad everyone was okay, and track warrants can get tricky sometimes, on the short line I work for we are dark territory so lots of track warrants
Mainstream media usually does not depend on experts or even interested amateurs in their reporting, and (thanks to how media are financed) are primarily interested in getting clicks rather than reporting. That's why people who are not dependent on these clicks for their main income (an important caveat) are often (not always, sadly) better than professional journalists at reporting facts on a topic they are interested in. With anyone directly or indirectly deriving their main income from the clicks, you unfortunately always have to be careful. There are still some good ones, but the temptation to go for clicks over facts is always there.
What happens in practice most often is that during these signal suspensions the trains run using blocks. They usually will have Trainmasters or Road Foreman at the terminals having job briefings with any crews coming on duty that will be operating through the suspension area. They even produce track diagrams highlighting the suspension area and the names of the blocks. The switch tender and the crews very likely know each other too. It all sounds simple enough, but everyone is half asleep and in a hurry. It only takes one incorrect action on the part of anyone involved to have an accident.
That's why it's important to have several pairs of eyes on the critical parts. unfortunately, that costs money and is an easy target for the bean counters.
Reminds me of the fatal accident in SC while installing some of the PTC equipment. Amtrak was approaching an industrial area. Dispatch told the train crew working in the area to clear the main line, .. The conductor didn't line a switch properly, resulting in Amtrak having a horrible accident. Throw in the accident (also in SC) where the NS train went into a siding and wrecked causing a huge chlorine leak. Graniteville cost lives, a factory, and destroyed homes. (Chlorine is not nice to deal with..) All due to mis-aligned switches. And of course, the Amtrak wreck in Michigan, where they had been working on the signals in the Amtrak owned track where the person working on the equipment had bypassed the switch so that the signal showed GREEN, when it should have been Yellow or Red. Humans are always capable of causing issues, and I have a feeling that a conductor or dispatcher is going to find new employment as a result of the Mess in the Funnel... Sad. Very Sad.
This explains a lot. When it happened, I asked why PTC didn't prevent it. Now I know that it was suspended for maintenance. Also, I had stated that the inter.odal should not have been routed towards the Jesup sub. This explains it all. Glad the crews were ok
Dude, don't be a hole! The engineer, my friend of many years, was going 38 in a 40 restriction. The "NEW" restricted speed requirement came after this incident. Some of you foamers can be so clueless sometimes. We are not free to just speed thru restrictions like a trucker on the interstate.
There maybe multiple people to point fingers at regarding what happened but, the biggest has to be the switch tender on duty. They may have been inexperienced but, how hard is it to throw the switch then step up and visually confirm that the switch was lined correctly? The northbound wasn't allowed to come through until he said it was clear. Would've only taken a few extra seconds to check and they didn't. Another example of common sense not be used. They may have been under a lot of pressure but, seems all the more reason to leave no room for doubt.
So other than the signal system and PTC being suspended, and the track under control of the dispatcher, and the speed of the intermodal train, we really don't know that much.
Y'all need to put a camera there cuz this happens again if you got a camera sitting there they can see there's something sitting there and wouldn't have another train smashing into it
Why haven't they added GPS to trains and, at least on the mains, turnout alignment info? If all 18 wheelers have them, along with navigation telling them and everyone else where they are and what roads are closed. Why can't they adapt that to the rails? (besides them crying that it will cost too much)
Train I032 was NB on the Nahunta Sub Track #1. Train L743 was SB and holding Nahunta Sub Track #1 north of the switch at "the Throat", as it's known locally. I032 was supposed to have been routed diverging onto Jesup Sub Track #2 but was instead routed down the normal orientation into the standing L743. There is footage on the Virtual Railfan channel showing I032 as it heads toward the collision, followed by the sound of the impact and smoke rising in the distance.
For the life of me, I still do not see this as a “HEAD ON” collision. I see the damaged locomotives of the intermodal train. I see damaged and mangled hopper cars of the work train. But - I do not see any locomotives of the work train. It just looks to me like the intermodal ran into the REAR end of the work train. Hence: not a Head On collision. Someone please correct me (provide evidence) if I am incorrect on this point. Thanks
@@eleanorhodges8204 It was indeed a head-on collision. The lead units on the northbound I032 were ET44AH's #3299 and #3469. They collided with the power for L743, AC44CW #245, AC4400CWM #7256, and ES40DC #5402, shoving those three units back into their own train and shredding the hoppers. Video footage from the Virtual Railfan camera near the fire station captured I032 as it headed for the collision, including the emergency brake activation, the sound of the impact, and the smoke and dust cloud rising from the collision location that was hidden by trees. In the still pictures shown in this video, I032's power is the two units on the right side of the screen. The three units beyond that were the L743's power, with #5402 derailed through the remains of a hopper car.
Back in the day,a General Order,would have been issued,and the area involved would have flagmen,and torpedoes would have been used to alert engineers and conductors that they were in a work area! The uses of flares,also would have been used,as a backup to the system! Mayhaps,the reintroduction of Rule 99,on flagging might prevent these obvious blunders! The bean counters,in the long run,cause more money being spent,and create more problems in the long term! Safety is never the problem,it's the attitude of both MANAGEMENT,and the workers,manning the details! Bad management has destroyed more companies,countries,and cultures,without fail! Thank you 😇 😊!
Two mistakes, switch tender misaligned the turnout and engineer running over speed to stop the train of sight of a problem (misalignment of a turnout).
@@thomasklimchuk441 Nope. Both the engineer and conductor receive the same instructions from the dispatcher. If their track warrant authorized them for a specific speed range in a certain location, then they had no reason to believe the warrant was in error if no special instructions were specified.
Speed was don’t exceed that if faster than being able to stop in half the distance you can see. In other words if you meet another train coming towards you both could stop in time to avoid a collision. They could have seen the misalignment of the turnout and stopped in time with no problem before rear ending the work train that the misaligned turnout set them into.
@@billloffler8637 Was under the impression the restricted speed requirement was implemented AFTER the incident. Re-watched the video - apparently the restriction requirement was in effect at the time. If that's the case, then the I032 crew is likely jobless now.
In other countries, they close the whole line section while they are working on signals. They don't run trains without signals (except for radio controlled ETCS).
And if ETCS goes down, the train _stops._ Of course, then they might get movement orders via radio - but around here, those work very much like those new CSX rules. Also, I don't know how it's handled over there, but around here, such orders must always be in writing, that is, both sides must write down those orders (typically on a form that already has options and fields for all the relevant details). Also, when someone cut two cables that controlled pretty much all of the north of the country (which was clearly intentional - it turns out part of that information was public but was not supposed to be), what happened was that they _stopped all trains in the north of the country._ All of them. Until they could re-establish signaling. Incidentally, a railfan found that same document and reported on it on RU-vid - the railway phoned him and asked him to please take that down, so he did and created a new video that didn't show the parts of the PDF with the critical info. I think it took at least another day or two before the info finally vanished from the railway webserver - I think I saw the first video, went to Google, and had no trouble finding that same document. Railways are people. People make mistakes. Computers can help, but there are always edge cases.
@@jamesyoung7655 Derailments in the US happen far too often. I looked it up a while ago, and if I remember correctly, it was something like one a day. Most don't make the news.
@@jamesyoung7655 Not that much more. I wish I remembered more details - I think I contrasted it with numbers for either Europe or the EU, but I'm not certain. It's been a while. I'd say it's probably a combination of high traffic and the cheapest possible track maintenance. (And of course a few other things, but I think these two are the most important.)
So much false information in this video, it’s pathetic and complete BS. Just say you don’t know what ACTUALLY happened and move on. You’re another reason why RR don’t like most Railfans 🙄
So they are blaming the crew. NOTHING to do with all the cutbacks with safety staff being fired in their thousands. Also the infrastructure in the USA is pathetic. Nearly every day their are derailments. It's a very rare thing to happen here in the UK or Europe.
