Ab,
You make some very valid points. Looking at how and when the employees were
arrested makes me sceptical of how this whole thing will be handled by the
legal system. And, this accident is a result of "Bottom Line" thinking.
HOWEVER I still don't understand exactly how or why this train ran away. An
interesting point was made that having a unit running or not should not affect
the train brake application, so why did the train run away? As an ex
railroader, I want to know what went wrong. My experience is all on
locomotives so I don't know car air brakes well at all.
Certainly we should wait for the report but I want to understand things better
to understand what actually went wrong with this train.
Paul Smith
Winnipeg
From: cpsig@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
To: cpsig@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Date: Sun, 25 May 2014 07:10:55 -0300
Subject: [cpsig] Re: Fw: Central Maine & Quebec CEO: 'We'll have to prove
ourselves'
I am a former air brake instructor/inspector. However, I have been out of the
field for many years, and will not comment on the specific equipment.
You don't have to be railway litterate to figure out that leaving a train
unattended, dangerous goods or no, enough hand brakes applied or no, doors
locked or no, on the mainline without a derail, at or near the top of a
downgrade, is hardly a safe practice, standard practice or not.
The Titanic and Lac Megantic were wakeup calls about the abuse of technology
but we have yet to get the message 100 years on.
As to waiting for the report, the findings and the charges are in the context
of a legal system were it is illegal, maybe even criminal for me to smoke pot
in my backyard, but it is perfectly legal to put dangerous additives in foods,
produce and sell products that destroy the environment, and invade countries on
some pretext and kill millions of innocent people, all in the name of profit.
I would not trust the government and its multinational sponsered lackies to
fairly judge a dog fight.
AbBaird
Sent from Samsung tablet
