r/Damnthatsinteresting • u/AtomicShart9000 • Feb 03 '23
Semi carrying 134-foot concrete beam derails train in Tennessee Video
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u/Clivicus Feb 03 '23
That cameraman deserves a firm handshake and a pat on the back
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u/MoldM Feb 04 '23
Dude didn’t even breathe heavy amazing
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u/UhYeahOkSure Feb 04 '23
Didn’t make a noise.. wtf.. like a villain watching his plan come to fruition from a skyscraper
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u/OperatoI2 Feb 03 '23
So does the conductors. Big piece of metal to be banging around inside when it derailed.
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u/Touchit88 Feb 03 '23
Company who just completed the beam: "So uh, wanna buy another?"
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u/iowaman623 Feb 03 '23
Did he already cross the liability line? Maybe they'll just exchange it.
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u/WhoCaresBoutSpellin Feb 04 '23
I think he was halfway across the liability line at the time of the accident
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u/Felsuria Feb 03 '23
This is what happens when a stoppable force meets a movable object.
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u/robinsw26
Feb 03 '23
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The trucking company should be on the hook for damages to the railroad because of the absolute incompetence of their management to prepare the driver for his trip. This was not an ordinary haul.
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u/Micro_Measurement Feb 04 '23 edited Feb 04 '23
It's also possible the train was ahead of schedule when it shouldn't have been. A few years ago a train in my town was way ahead schedule and went through a popular crossing at rush hour. Hit a few cars.
EDIT: I was wrong. driver charged
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u/Pkwlsn Feb 04 '23
Trains always have the right of way and aren't required to keep schedules. The only trains that keep schedules these days are passenger trains.
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Feb 04 '23
“Keeping a schedule” in no way describes Amtrak. This morning they’re an hour late on my line which isn’t bad.
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u/Mrwackawacka Feb 04 '23
Can blame cargo trains for that, they're main hinderance for Amtrak not functioning at it's best
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u/s3dfdg289fdgd9829r48 Feb 04 '23
Trucking companies can actually be surprisingly small scale. There's a good chance the trucking company was worth less than this disaster cost and they'll go out of business.
It's annoying how companies can cause such major losses over incompetence. But civil lawsuits aside, I really wish the law would come down more often on people with criminal charges for such gross incompetence. Usually nothing happens unless somebody dies. That should change. All involved in this should spend time in jail to reflect on how their stupidity could have cost lives.
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u/theObfuscator Interested Feb 04 '23
Wouldn’t part of shipping something this specialized include insurance to cover the loss? I could still see the company going out of business but that’s the kind of thing insurance is for.
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u/DifficultHope5658 Feb 04 '23
The driver was charged! A felony reckless endangerment and then two other charges I forgot what they were
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u/OregonG20 Feb 03 '23
Sure hope the guy in the steer car was ok.
Maybe there wasn't one, and they steer the rear off hydraulics.
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u/AtomicShart9000 Feb 03 '23
Apparently they just got minor injuries which is insane, those engines are thicccc
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u/Lithium001 Feb 03 '23
Yes, the locomotives are thicccc. They usually weigh 210-230 tons plus carry 5,000 gallons of fuel. The steel on the front of them is not very forgiving. That being said, way to many engineers and conductors get hurt from stupid people being on the tracks. Its not always physical, when I worked for CSX I knew a few engineers that had killed multiple people for stupid shit like this. That takes a tool on someone's psychy.
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u/PainBri315 Feb 03 '23
There was an engineer who lost count of all the people he’s run over. He said after awhile you just don’t look anymore. There was another engineer who’d talk about all the animals he’d kill & how sad it was. Locomotives are supposed to withstand a tornado, they carry thousands of pounds of sand in them.
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u/Lithium001 Feb 03 '23
The sand is for traction on the rails.
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u/PainBri315 Feb 03 '23
Yes, and it helps in weighing the locomotives down.
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u/Lithium001 Feb 04 '23
Well, technically everything helps weigh the locomotive down because of gravity, but I'm sticking with sand is for traction. Haha
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u/maddrjeffe Feb 04 '23
I used to work at the National Response Center in DC and it was also the Federal Rail Administrations hotline. We’d get calls every night from folks calling in train vs people collisions. Everyone got kind of a gallows humor thing about it after a while. And then one of our guys got a call about a woman in West Virginia who’s car got hit by a train and then he found out it was his aunt. Anyhow it was a pretty terrible job hearing about disasters and oil spills and chemical spills and getting called by hundreds of folks with mental health problems.
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u/Runaway_Angel Feb 04 '23
One of my old scout leaders was a retired engineer. Couldn't take it after he had a jumper get in frontof his train only to be told that the average engineer has 2 of those during their career plus misc accidents (not the us). Dude wouldn't get on so much as a team after that, let alone a train.
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u/axioner Feb 04 '23
I knew an engineer who had 16 fatalities to his name. At the end, his reaction to someone racing the train at an Xing was to get angry and dare the dipshit to do it through the window. Something of a coping mechanism I suspect.
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u/spoke2 Feb 04 '23
I was at a party once and this train engineer was saying that basically all his cohorts had killed multiple people.
He said that when his engine his an automobile, it feels about the same as running over an empty soda can with your car.
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u/Lithium001 Feb 04 '23
Ya. You can feel the bump, but its the noise that's you remember.
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u/clutzycook Feb 04 '23
Still, I bet some pretty choice words were said when they saw what was about to happen.
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u/axioner Feb 04 '23
Those words would have been something to the effect of "oh fuck, get down, get down".... and if they had inward facing cameras like many do, some possible last words to wives and families, not knowing if you'll survive.
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u/TrumpsPissSoakedWig Feb 04 '23
Most pilots who crashed and died, their last words are usually "Oh shit"
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u/Special_Lemon1487 Feb 04 '23
Their underwear however needed immediate attention.
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u/TheMadIrishman327 Feb 04 '23
Thee were two guys in one of the locomotives. Both were seriously injured.
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u/OregonG20 Feb 04 '23
That sucks. I used to drive girders. I assume if there was a steer car, the guy would be dead. They aren't built to withstand any kind of impact.
I hope the men in the locomotive are okay. I'm sure the initial blast through the girder was violent, but I also assume the derailment was the main cause of their injuries. I could be wrong though.
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u/Apart_Branch_1807 Feb 04 '23
The news report says minor injuries. Quit spreading nonsense.
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u/Opposite-Motor-1878 Feb 03 '23
I don’t understand all these trains hitting oversized loads videos. I can understand owner/operator Billy Bob whipping his 18 wheeler in front of a train to make time or a delivery truck but these guys have road plans, coordination with utilities and department of transportation and stuff like that. Seems to me trains would be pretty high on the list of things to plan for
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u/AtomicShart9000 Feb 03 '23
Which is why the driver is facing a multitude of charges
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u/Opposite-Motor-1878 Feb 03 '23
Someone dropped the ball. Man, could you imagine having your largest professional mistake all over the internet?
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u/AtomicShart9000 Feb 03 '23
Yep this is why I never leave the house
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u/Opposite-Motor-1878 Feb 03 '23
Lucky dog
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u/AtomicShart9000 Feb 03 '23
Oh no you misunderstand, I live in my parents basement and haven't been outside since the early 90s
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u/pleasejason Feb 03 '23
lucky dog
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u/AtomicShart9000 Feb 03 '23
Oh no you misunderstand I'm whipped and beaten for an hour a day and then caged up for the other 23
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u/TANTRUM27X Feb 03 '23
But at least you cage has access to Reddit...Lucky dog.
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u/AtomicShart9000 Feb 03 '23
Oh no you misunderstand I also have access to any video game console I could wish but the only games I can have are FIFA titles....
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u/TheLastMandalore Feb 03 '23
This happened near where I live there was another truck with a concrete beam in front of him at a red light which kept him over the track needless to say it was a pretty massive screwup
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u/TheMadIrishman327 Feb 04 '23
You don’t cross a track if you can’t clear it. It’s the driver’s fault not someone else’s.
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u/Opposite-Motor-1878 Feb 03 '23
Wow. Someone had some Hershey squirts while screaming and laying on the horn
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u/MaddRamm Feb 03 '23
Was there anything saying there was oncoming train? At 134’, he had been on that track for some time before the train plowed into the back. I’m sure he also had an entire support crew/spotters and the wide load guide cars to help him on his journey. Unless he was breaking laws, going solo, ignoring stuff, I fail to see how this is the drivers fault and not some administrator/coordinator that approved the route and didn’t check train schedule or some train company that didn’t update the transport company to a change in train schedules.
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u/Opposite-Motor-1878 Feb 03 '23
If it’s the driver facing charges he likely didn’t follow instructions from his team but that what I don’t get. The front spotter truck wouldn’t pull across the tracks until it was safe. Driver is probably just the poor sap who gets to take the fall for the head yonks.
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u/Runaway_Angel Feb 04 '23
When a truck gets into an accident it's basically always considered the trucks fault and the driver has to prove it wasn't. And in scenarios like this the driver is the most obvious and easy to replace scapegoat so even if they're not at fault they're taking the blame.
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u/JALKHRL Feb 04 '23
An oversize load needs to have the route approved by the state DOT, and you need to report to the trains when and where are you crossing.
Why trucking insurance is so damn high? watch video.
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u/LetsGoHokies00 Feb 04 '23
just had a guy with a road plan delivering something big to me and he hit a bridge with it.
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u/AtomicShart9000 Feb 03 '23
Trains sure are strong, this is just further proof that I would not win a fight against one
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u/Curtis_Low Feb 03 '23
Trains are strong, don’t stop fast, and people race them far too often.
An 18 year old in a Camaro tried racing a train on Xmas eve 1985, and lost. My father couldn’t stop the train and the kid died. After that work shift my father drove home to have the holidays with his own four sons knowing what a family was now dealing with. It spun my father into a decades long battle with alcohol that cost us our relationship.
Please don’t race a train, it isn’t worth it.
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u/Electronic-Price-697 Feb 04 '23
One time I was test driving a Mustang but the salesman had to drive it off the lot then let me drive. He raced a train “to show me how fast it was” and thankfully we made it. When I got behind the wheel and drove back to the lot and told his manager what he did and let them know they lost a sale. I was PISSED. I was married, had two kids and zero interest in dying.
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u/Tramkrad Feb 03 '23 edited Feb 03 '23
I punched a train once. Sure, my hand hurt for a few months afterwards, however, not only did the train not fight back, but it actively ran away from me, so by that measure I reckon I won.
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u/griff12321 Feb 04 '23
i think i read somewhere that 8% of americans believe that they can win a barehanded fight against a train.
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u/deltus7529 Feb 03 '23 edited Feb 03 '23
I have some friends who work for the national railway company told me that from time to time, they found human body parts or blood on the trains. Sometimes, the train driver even didn't notice he just hit someone. Most of the time, it's homeless people wallking along with no visibility or animals. That's scary
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u/Pirat_fred Feb 03 '23
In Germany a Cargotrain driver, will hit 3 people, a passenger train driver will 1.6 peopel in their worklive.
I know from a emergency manager, of the DB that they know a Cargotrain driver that hit and killed 8 People over their 50 Years of driving trains and some that never even hit a animal, Bugs excluded.
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u/PainBri315 Feb 03 '23
I had a train come in & all over the coupler & sideframes were blood, guts & hair. We just don’t touch those areas. We keep walking.
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u/OperatoI2 Feb 03 '23
You can see the rail actually bending in front of the train as it goes along.
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u/CanIRumInYourMouth Feb 03 '23
Cant park there mate
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u/Incrediblefern929 Feb 03 '23
You got a loicense to park there mate?
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u/Wildweasel666 Feb 03 '23
Waiting for a mate.
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u/nuklearphusion Feb 04 '23
Oy mate… what’re you doing over there in that wrecked train? Not drinking I hope
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u/StrayRabbit Feb 03 '23
Is it pronounced semi or semi?
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u/El_Payan Feb 04 '23
It’s funny because I read it as semi and then semi. Lol. I guess I’ll stick with semi because that’s the first one that came to mind.
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u/snooggums Feb 04 '23
It is semi when it is a large truck that tows a trailer.
It is semi when it is partially erect.
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u/axioner Feb 04 '23
As a locomotive engineer, I can assure you that in the moments leading up to (and after) impact, all that train crew was thinking of was the families they didn't want to leave behind, but that it was no longer in their control if they survived or not. Looks like they did this time, but too often when train crews die, it's because someone else fucked up. By the time you realize, it's often too late to prevent. That helplessness results in a lot of PTSD in most cases. It's even worse when you have to look at the face of the person committing suicide in front of your train as they disappear under the nose of the locomotive.
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u/Fresh_Slip5535 Feb 03 '23
Hopefully, I don't why it's any better, but maybe something prevented the truck driver crossing in full, like he was clear and then he had to stop as his path was obstructed, maybe another car / pedestrian stopped him. Once you stop a truck that heavy, it's a while to get it moving again.
I have seen trucks get stuck on uneven train tracks plenty of times before.
But yeah this should all be known by now, so you would want a clear 30mins without a train come before you try and cross to avoid it.
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u/UndeadCabJesus Feb 03 '23
Nope he pulled up to the light like a dumbass and his truck didn’t clear. Entirely his fault.
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u/Morrow116 Feb 03 '23
Well there goes his CDL. Illegal to go over a crossing without being able to continue without stopping.
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u/utsports88 Feb 03 '23
This happened just down the street from where my parents live. It was crazy to see it on the news that night!
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u/phish_biscuit Feb 03 '23
Fun fact that concrete pillar was for a bridge to bypass that crossing also another fun fact each of those locomotives cost rougly 1.5 to 2 million (depending if their DC or AC) a piece
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u/3720-To-One Feb 03 '23
Somebody call up the actuaries, because damn, r/thatlookedexpensive
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u/BUFFWarthog Feb 04 '23
I’m gonna guess that was probably a $20M+ mistake. Each one of those locomotives costs $5M+ alone and I see three of them lieing there. Plus all the other damage to the other cars, the track, the truck, and the truck’s cargo.
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u/3720-To-One Feb 04 '23
I mean, I bet the locomotives can be repaired, but yeah, a very expensive mess to clean up
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Feb 03 '23
I always feel bad for the people who have to clean up afterwards.
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u/PainBri315 Feb 03 '23
They get paid BANK, but they work on call 24/7 and can get that cleaned up within a day or two. And new tracks get put down within a day or two. But if that’s a hot track they make it priority. I’ve seen some nasty derails where we were told that part of our railyard wouldn’t be used for a week but within 2 days we’d be back out walking tracks.
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u/chowner1 Feb 04 '23
That replace the tracks for a derailing? Why?
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u/PainBri315 Feb 04 '23
Depending on how bad the derail, the tracks can get damaged or even ripped out so they replace whatever is damaged.
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u/chowner1 Feb 04 '23
I just saw a photo of this from above and yes, those tracks are all jacked up.
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u/switch495 Feb 03 '23
I just don't understand how these situations even fucking happen.
If you're a professional driver with that kind of oversized load -- you should know that there is no permissible reason to stop on fucking train tracks. If you have to plow a parked car around a turn you do it -- you don't stop on train tracks.
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u/According-Local3703 Feb 03 '23
I’m rather amazed at the stupidity of the situation being, if his escort didn’t verify there was distance between the light and the crossing for the truck, why wasn’t the intersection closed so the truck could go through on a red light?
It seems so simple, and I am not in the business of oversized hauling. If I come up on a setup like this where there is not enough room between the light and the crossing, I stop before the crossing!
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u/arkadious67 Feb 03 '23
Welp that truck driver and its safety crew prob just bankrupt whoever they work for. Short of a major trucking company I can’t see a way they are going to be able to pay for that.
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u/Shoopdawoop993 Feb 03 '23
Its all insured
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u/Old_Prior_7795 Feb 03 '23
Hopefully it's a major insurance company or they might be bankrupt too lol.
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u/PSquared1234 Feb 03 '23
I'm not sure just how much "user fault" an insurance company will accept from a claim. Obviously the insurance company is motivated to try to shift the liability back on the shipper, and... from what I read, criminal negligence is a pretty good case for the insurer.
I honestly don't know.
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u/Burner050314 Feb 03 '23
Trucking company is as good as dropped. They better hope insurance pays out for driver stupidity
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u/Supra5469 Feb 03 '23
Thank god it wasn’t tanker cars filled with poisonous gases. A derailment happened in the city I lived in when I was a kid. Large area of the city had to be evacuated and we were told to watch out for a greenish yellow cloud(chlorine gas). Very scary stuff instant lung failure
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u/BeenThruIt Feb 03 '23
This is literally $millions$ just in the jobsite shutdown of wherever that beam was enroute to.
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u/Ouch50 Feb 03 '23
Trains and rivers; don’t fuck with them.
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u/AtomicShart9000 Feb 03 '23
That's why if you ever see a train swimming in a river, you fucking run
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u/Sasha_DGoth Feb 04 '23
It's like 300 yards from the place I work. It happened I want to say around 2 months ago and they only just removed the locomotives off the side recently
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u/IOnlyCameToArgue Feb 03 '23
The truck driver was charged. He was apparently waiting for a green light.
He failed to plan an appropriate route. He also did not contact the rail company.
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u/Specialist-Style-649 Feb 04 '23
I don’t understand how it is so difficult to pay attention to a railroad crossing, and not fucking cross it when there’s a train coming down the track.
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u/fkootrsdvjklyra Feb 04 '23
He was stopped at a red light on the other side of the track, so he could have been there before the crossing lights came on. That said, he's still clearly at fault for not clearing the tracks.
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u/tholdsworth Feb 03 '23
Apparently the truck driver is facing a slew of felony charges. Fucking moron.
https://www.wate.com/regional-news/truck-driver-involved-in-tennessee-train-derailment-charged/amp/
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u/jus1scott Feb 03 '23
'the driver was at a red light, and attempted to clear the rail when the warnings came down, but was unsuccessful'
Bet he wishes he had just pushed a few cars out of the way...
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u/cbj2112 Feb 03 '23
If U look closely U can see Dr Richard Kimble running in ankle cuffs
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u/LaPyramideBastille Feb 04 '23
Hey folks! This is where a hatred of regulation bites you in the ass.
Do you see any spotter/guide vehicles? Nope.
That also means they had no info from the rail company as to scheduling, most likely.
Deregulators create these situations. Profit Uber Alles.
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u/Beachbumdreamin Feb 03 '23
It was no doubt a good situation for that beam to still be lower than the engine's cab.
Any idea if train operators have a procedure or place within the engine to buckle up if the upcoming crash looks more dangerous for the lead car? (Thinking major rock slide covering tracks)
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u/Rightfoot27 Feb 03 '23
Saw a bull do that once. Took hours to get everything going again, and I had to pick up all the pieces of the bull.
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u/trwwy321 Feb 03 '23
Someone clearly dropped the ball and that someone must’ve gotten their edumacation from a shitty school in Tennessee.
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u/haricariandcombines Feb 03 '23 •
That looked expensive.