Amazing what some people will do

[GCTTowerA]

I stumbled upon this article and I was left in a state of bewilderment...  

http://www.tauntongazette.com/news/business_news/x530602459/Police-investigate-theft-of-railroad-tracks-in-Taunton-today-train-derailed

and I find yet another instance...

http://www.wtsp.com/news/topstories/article/195270/250/Two-arrested-for-trying-to-steal-railroad-track-parts

I would say I'm amazed, however, this is just pathetic.

Addendum added 6/4/11

[ebtnut]

We had the same thing happen on the EBT a couple of years ago.  Granted, the rails stolen were on a part of the line that isn't used, but even so.  The miscreant was eventually located and prosecuted. 

[jward]

there is a big difference between lifting the rails on an abandoned section of railroad, and on an active rail line. if caught, the culprits are facing federal charges. i wonder if homeland security will get involved?

[ACY]

In Youngstown, the Home Depot mistakenly tore up active rail that crossed over the drive to their store, later that week they had to put it back when they were contacted by the RR. This was about 10 years ago.

[NarrowMinded]

Some people are just defective and don't think outside of their own little world.

I worked for a company that would ship via rail once in a while, we had a spur that ended in our lot. we had a project that came up that was so large the item had to go by rail, we were told there would be a slight delay because a company about a mile down had poured a concrete slab over the rail and had placed prefabbed office buildings on it. they had to move them all and tear up the slab along with the fence they had replaced with no pass through gates for the line.

NM

[phillyreading]

This is a little bit differant but the thing is that most major railroads have their signal lights tied into the rails, so if a rail seperation occurred the signal light would go to red and stay there even if over-rode at a tower.
That was done because of some railroads having bridges on their lines that lifted or went over very long bodies of water. A number of years ago, maybe ten years, a tug boat hit a bridge in the fog, near Alabama, bent the tracks
a little but left both rails still connected but severely deformed and that sent an Amtrak engine or two and at least two people in the engine to their death. The rail line was owned by CSX transportation.
Now they have some new device that can sense when the ballist is tampered with or washed out, costs a bit of money but it is worth it when you compare human life to the costs.
You can replace a train engine but you can't replace a person's life.
So anybody caught cutting railroad tracks that don't work for that railroad should be charged with attempted murder!

Lee F.

[Jim Banner]

And some railroads shoot themselves in the foot.  In one recent case in Canada, a railway put up a slide fence intended to set the signals to red if the fence was wiped out by a rock slide.  But the fence was a little short.  The railway saved the price of maybe 50 feet of fencing.  But the next slide was passed the end of the fence, resulting in a couple of damaged locomotives when they hit the undetected rock.  I never heard the final numbers but I suspect the repair costs were several hundred times as much as was saved on fencing.

Jim 

[jward]

we had an incident right here in pittsburgh about 10 years ago where a rockslide acme down on the lead engine. had to send 3 almost new locomotives to altoona for repairs, derailed at least 10 cars, and tied up a busy mainline with no detour route with no alternate route for most of the trains.

the location was a cliff about 100 feet high alongside the tracks, with no slide fence. the geology of pittsburgh ia particularly susceptable to landslides. rail lines usually follow deeply cut river valleys, with the right of way cut into the bluffs. soil is mostly clay, and bedrock is altenating layers of hard sandstone and easily eroded shale. when the shale crumbles underneath a sandstone layer, it eventually comes down in huge chunks.

in another "what were they thinking" moment, a local developer was trying to build a wal mart. money talks, regulations were bypassed, and permits issued by a municipality eager for the increased revenue the store would bring. the developer started dumping fill on top of a clay hillside, and when it rained the whole thing slid onto a 4 lane highway and the busy 3 track mainline. both were shut for days, and wal mart had to step in to pay for the mess. after 5 years, the side is still sliding......

[RAM]

It is funny what some reporter write.  Reporting on a man who walked up to a stopped NS train carrying an AK47 with 30 rounds and told the crew to get off.  After the crew go off he began to fire on the train. What they said was that he walked up to the train that was stopped on the tracks.  where else would you stop a train?