Eastern Railroad Discussion > Runaway Round-Up at Utica NY Union Station

Approximately two weeks after a juvenile released the brakes on a covered hopper setting in motion a wild 2.5 mile ride ending only when the runaway collided with a display engine (New York Central 0-6-0 6721) at Utica's Union Station, the New York, Susquehanna & Western Railroad removed the railcar yesterday.

This video shows highlights of that move.

Also, excellent security camera video of the incident here:

http://www.cnyhomepage.com/news/union-station-surveillance-footage

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I found this story to be so fascinating due to the fact that this hopper car was set free by vandals and wound up on that particular siding hitting the steam locomotive.  My question is why was the switch leading up to the steam locomotive set to come into that siding?  I would have thought that a run-a-way car would have gone elsewhere rather than into that particular siding.  To me this is strange or did someone set this switch to that siding on purpose?  What am I misssing here?  Comments?

ClubCar Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I found this story to be so fascinating due to the
> fact that this hopper car was set free by vandals
> and wound up on that particular siding hitting the
> steam locomotive.  My question is why was the
> switch leading up to the steam locomotive set to
> come into that siding?  I would have thought that
> a run-a-way car would have gone elsewhere rather
> than into that particular siding.  To me this is
> strange or did someone set this switch to that
> siding on purpose?  What am I misssing here?
>  Comments?

Dont think your missing much, if I remember correctly the display track is essentially the east yard lead for NYSW Uitca yard and there might also be a crossover to the CSX(xNYC) main.  So if the errant car got lined into the yard there was virtually no place else to go.  Don't think there is any conspiracy as the car was tampered with by a 13 year old, so doubtful he was part of some sort of group/gang trying to create as much havoc as possible. 

ClubCar Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I would have thought that
> a run-a-way car would have gone elsewhere rather
> than into that particular siding.  To me this is
> strange or did someone set this switch to that
> siding on purpose?  What am I misssing here?

The only other place for the car to do would've been the CSX main based on the two options presented at the last switch before the steam engine.

Though not  intentional, it might have been better for the car to have gone where it did rather than out on the main? Hitting a loco on the main that was stopped would be one thing but what about if it would have hit a train's loco coming the other direction at speed? I'd hate to have seen crew members get seriously injured or killed.

Though I never worked on the RR, I did work among some high profile incidents in the manufacturing industry. If this is anything like that, someone has to come up with procedures so this will not happen again whether they are realistic or not.

Victor A. Baird
http://www.erstwhilepublications.com



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/04/15 16:17 by wabash2800.

WHERE'S THE DERAIL ??? !!! ...

any track that terminates into a public area NEEDS TO BE PROTECTED by a derail !!!

FRA mandated every siding with mainline access must be equipped with a derail derailing the errant runaway away from the mainline track ... there needs to be an andendum to that mandate to include trackage that has access to public areas and bldgs ...



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 08/04/15 09:30 by Out_Of_Service.

Actually, I believe there is a derail on the tail track but it is only used when cars are left on the tail. As there were no cars on the track the derail was not in the derailing position.  A better question would be "why was the derail on the storage track where the hopper car was stored for 2 weeks not in the derailing position?"

Ok, with a hinged derail or something lame like that on that particular track near the depot, what would have been the outcome? "If" the car derailed and did not run up and over the derail at speed, where would it have landed?