one dead dozens missing in Canadian train explosion
 

A train carrying oil has exploded in Quebec http://mobile.abc.net.au/news/2013-0...canada/4804052

Particularly nasty, it would seem that they found the locomotives up hill with their brakes on, at a guess I'd wager it was a broken coupling. Similar thing happened in Belgium but a bit less explosive, but the groundwater around the area was contaminated for a while.

It is good to see both Canadian and US firefighters working this fire. :yeah:

There are a couple recent derailments in Maine too. They could be signs of a larger problem with rail maintenance.

Once upon a time in the UK we had vacuum fitted trains, the brakes on the wagons were released by the creation of a vacuum which was done by the locomotive, as such the wagons were all interconnected with vacuum pipes.

http://www.d8233.org.uk/gallery/2013/130414_2.jpg

Like so. One additional benefit of this system was that if the coupling between the locomotive and the wagons broke, which was not uncommon, the brakes on the wagons automatically applied, which unless it was a very heavy train or on a very steep slope, would stop it cold.

Other safety systems we had, back in the old days, was the guards brake-van, or caboose as it's known elsewhere, which as its name suggested contained a handbrake which the guard would apply under certain circumstances, such as to help prevent the couplings from becoming too slack and then taut (which could break them if they go from slack to taut quickly whilst under heavy load) or if the guard realised that the train required braking assistance or had split in two. Signalmen were taught to check each train that went past for the red light on the rear of the brake-van or guard coach, if it wasn't there then it was quite likely that the train had split.

I don't really know the area so I don't know what sort of gradient the locomotives were on when the train split, but unless the brakes failed completely it would have to have been a fairly hefty grade to a) override the safety systems of the wagons and b) create enough speed in the runaway to derail (unless it went against a facing point/switch).

Time will tell, as will the investigation, but in the meantime this is a horrific accident and my heart goes out to the victims.

How terribly tragic :nope:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-23218614

Here's a link with the latest info:

http://www.montrealgazette.com/news/...661/story.html

Must admit I'm curious that the location of the conductor(engineer?) who was supposed to take over the train is unknown.

The fire on the locomotives before the wagons detached is likely to be of major importance as to how the wagons were a) able to detach in the first place and b) ran away.
Even so, I'm surprised that modern safety systems don't automatically apply the brakes of the wagons when the connection to the locomotives is lost. It's not an American continent thing either, we had a runaway on the London Underground a few years ago that chased a passenger train, fortunately there was no impact, but the fact that it happened indicated some sort of braking system on the wagons is either not in place or is inadequate to cope with the gradients on the routes it travels. (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-10964766)

There is some speculation that the proper amount of handbrakes were not applied to deal with the gradient involved. I'm also surprised to find out that the Montreal, Maine & Atlantic railroad received approval in May/2012 for Quebec of single person operation assisted by a remote control caboose:

http://www.easternrailroadnews.com/2...-person-crews/


Not sure if that was the case here but if so, it seems that may of been a huge contributing factor as to why not enough handbrakes were set if that turns out to be true.