Ah Great looking Engine Spike 190! Gotta love adding all that wire to those pistons!
Sorry I got that footage in my E-mail here is the 411 on it.
Train hit by
tornado. Occurred in Illinois earlier this year -- camera is on rear
locomotive. Watch, especially to the left -- watch the trees bend, debris
in the air, and you can actually see the tornado pass from right to left.
The trestles was moved out of alignment to the eft 18 inches -- the tank
car was a load of Ethylene Oxide -- nasty stuff ---
I thought it was kinda interesting as We all thought that the momentum of a moving loaded train really was too heavy for a little thing like a tornado to effect. See a lot of tornado's tracking cross country but have only seen standing cars pushed along the rails before.
Well the fact that the engine stopped rather quickly but not the train was probably just physics. I wish Nam were here as he could break out the chaulk board and explain it better,
Once the airline ( trainline) was broken the 90lbs of pressure escapes all at once causing all the breaks to emercency apply to maximum stopping force. Since the train was cut apart by the tornado the 2 engines that have more breaking power dragging just one box car would have stopped within 200ft probably.
My guess is the cars that flipped were all likely empty box cars which are used to give some cover(distance) between the Crew cab and the Hazardous Material tank car in case of accident. Also probably why the tornado was able to flip them right off the rail. So the rest of the train even though in Emercency braking still had all the momentum and ker powey!
Had the cars remained together this momentum would have just meant the train would have pushed the Engines along. During an Emergency break application the procedure actually requires us to release the engine brakes called actuating or the difference in braking power causes an effect similar to being rear ended at a stop sign by a semi truck doing 55 mph. The wet rail from the rain also would reduce the friction.
To give some perspective on the forces involved a loaded coal car weighs 120 tons multiply that by a hundred cars give or take and the weight of three engines traveling at 50 mph on flat dry rail takes every bit of 2 miles to stop in an emergency sparks flying the whole way.
Engines alone probably 100 to 200 ft to stop. What a diff a few thousands of tons make. ![Dead [xx(]](/emoticons/icon_smile_dead.gif)