A Good Day Railfanning Gone Wrong.

On Wednesday, my friend Travis and I decided to go out railfanning because of where the weather was going to be absolutely beautiful. At first, we decided to out pace Amtrak to the bridge at Falls View in Fayette County to get some video and such. When we heard Mr. Hensley, the engineer, calling out the signal at "South Malden." We were starting to think that we had screwed ourselves over and would catch him. We kept thinking that until the dispatcher for the New River Subdivision came over the radio and said, "Someone stole the code line around Mount Carbon and I would have to talk you by the signal at Mount Carbon." So, after we had heard the convo between the 'spatcher and Amtrak. Then we knew within an instant that we were going to beat him to the bridge and then some.


After we had caught Amtrak on the bridge, we decided to head back across the river to see what we could find on the other side. As we were getting ahead of Amtrak, we passed the Elkem Metals Plant and the small rail yard at Alloy, WV. I just happened to notice that there was a Herzog rock train setting on one of the yard tracks. After we had got done with Amtrak, we decided to go and see if the rock train was still setting in the yard. We go by the yard and it wasn't there. So we drove up and down US 60 to see if we could find it. Needless to say that we didn't find the damn thing. After that, we decided to call it a day or so we thought....

A couple of minutes after I had been dropped off close to the house. I decided that instead of getting something to eat I would head for home. As I am walking down the street I just happen to hear the defect detector about five miles down the road activate. As I am listening to the scanner I thought that something wasn't right about this because that dectector should have already gave the axle count and such. It was then I heard, "N658-01 EMERGENCY EMERGENCY Milepost 449.4!!! After listening for about another minute when the dispatcher answered the radio and asked what was wrong. The engineer came over the radio and said, "N658-01 to the dispatcher. We are stopped at milepost 449.4 because the emergency brakes came on and we don't know why." He also told the conductor walking the train that he couldn't get the air pressure to build back up and that he had tried at least three or four times to pump it with no success.

Little did that engineer know what happened until the conductor got to the new rear end of the train.














Talk about one big ol' fashion mess...

lol is your confused looking mug supposed to be in the mix?

Also I find it PRETTY suspicious that you were there before hand and got all these great pictures...

YOU WERE IN ON IT! ADMIT IT!

CONSPIRACY! Sound the ATS alarms! 10/7/2011 Amtrak attacks were an inside job!

Just kidding fella.

I don't know how you can be so into trains. I think it sounds like about as much fun as watching paint dry. I watched your video of the train moving at a snail's pace and bellowing obnoxiously loud whistles and boy... what a pastime.

To each his own though.

Good luck with your alibi.

Pics or no...oh wait.

Fake! That was CG...oh wait.

Perhaps it was the illumina....oh wait.


I'm gonna blame this one on The Grimace.

[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/db3c9d0f84c4.jpg[/atsimg]

reply to post by DieBravely


If you had grown up near the tracks
as I did you would probably feel
differently. I think they are awesome
(and I am female if that makes any
difference). I love standing on the
bridge waiting for the train.

OP great pics!!!

Originally posted by Absco
I'm gonna blame this one on The Grimace.

[atsimg]http://files.abovetopsecret.com/images/member/db3c9d0f84c4.jpg[/atsimg]

LOL!!!

I can't say that I disagree with the claim that The Grimace did it. Maybe it is his way of remind us that he is still that purple menace from those McDonald's commercials from years ago.

For some reason I think he's always had it in for me....

Good job no one was hurt in this wreck. (I'm assuming) I read the title to your thread and I thought it was going to lead into an injury or a fatality. I'm happy it didn't.

Agreed. To each his own.

That was totally my fault with my mug being in there. Actually those photos were about fifteen minutes after the wreck had happened. I admit that it was an inside job of sorts. Inside job as in the inside, south, rail breaking as the rain went over it. Hey now, Amtrak was on the horn to let those maintenance dipsticks know to get out of the way. Plus, he was down to ten miles an hour due to a speed restriction.

reply to post by hhcore


The only thing that got hurt was the train crew's sense of pride thank goodness. Look at photos one and two and you will really see how close the neighborhood came to disaster. Hint hint the propane tanks for the switch heaters to the crossovers.

reply to post by gimmefootball400


Did you hear it?

I'm assuming that no HazMat was involved as the pics don't show anyone looking to worried.

Was there even a load?

reply to post by gimmefootball400


You made me realized that I love trains also. It was something I have taken for granted since childhood and never realized. We lived within spitting distance of the tracks and a small depot and telegraphy office in east central Illinois. The tracks and our depot, with Mrs. Rictor at the telegraph key, was our playground and coalminer trains were our pastime taking and bringing our fathers home from the mines.
Eventually, they shut the mine, closed the depot, sold the rail line, and even removed the rails themselves. I started looking up for UFOs and forgot about trains as my early passion. Thanks for letting us inside such an intimate segment of your life. It was nice, a far, welcomed step away from typical ATS (that I usually indulge in).

reply to post by TDawgRex


I didn't hear the crash itself but I did hear the engineer declaring an emergency over the main CSX channel through here. Then he called up the dispatcher saying what he had though happened. It wasn't until the conductor had walked to the last car that was upright and saw that both tracks were blocked.

To answer your question on whether or not this guy was loaded or not. He was loaded as he was heading for one of the power plants over in Virginia.

How many carts are on those trains?
I know in the UK passenger trains usually have a max of 12 carts.
But for these guy's not to know what happened right behind them must be a long train.

Cool pics.

reply to post by Chukkles


According to his manifest and the fact that the first sixty nine cars and the last seventeen cars were still on the tracks. Along with the fifteen cars that were piled up everywhere. He had one hundred and two cars before he derailed.

reply to post by gimmefootball400


That is a crazy long train, no wonder they go so slow.
Yes I get now why they didn't notice.

Maybe they should not cut on costs and lower the maximum carts.

reply to post by Chukkles


Well, here's the thing about this big old mess. My friend and I were there watching them clean it up and we started to speculate on what could have caused it. He is the one that came up with the possibility of the rail being broken. He said that they break may have been small enough as to where it didn't warn the dispatcher of a problem. Usually what happens is that if the rail is broken then it breaks the circuit between the last signal and the next one. This break may have been small enough as to where it wouldn't have made that "track light" show there being something in the signal block even though there wasn't a train in it before this one got there.




If it were to turn out to be a broken rail as to being the cause of it. It may have been due to the constant stress that it had endured over the years.