dekon
Staff Member
Posts: 634
|
Post by dekon on May 9, 2014 18:24:01 GMT -5
|
|
|
Post by iomalley on May 9, 2014 18:45:26 GMT -5
Yeah, that one's been floating around cyberspace for awhile. It certainly didn't happen Jan 2014 like the poster states, probably sometime in the 1990s.
|
|
|
Post by tjmfishing on May 9, 2014 19:05:03 GMT -5
Seen this one many times before. Couldn't have come much closer in my opinion and the fact that someone was in the right place at the right time with the camera is astonishing. The story was that the CP local had trackage rights on the CN main (can't remember where this was now, somewhere in Southern Ontario) and they used to work a small yard like that. Standard practice was to avoid occupying the main when the VIA train was due, no radio contact, ctc, or anything and they messed it up that day somehow.
Railroading used to be extremely dangerous (and still is to an extent) My great uncle was killed in a head on back in 1969 (way before my time) when an oncoming passenger train (CN 119) mistook a work train for their meet and slammed head on into my uncle's freight (CN 748). He, as well as the fireman on 119 were unable to jump from their respective RS-18's in time and perished. My grandfather also had three or four very close calls over his 40 years on that same line, one of which involved missing a head on by less than two minutes.
|
|
|
Post by iomalley on May 10, 2014 9:04:24 GMT -5
We did OCS training when I became a conductor and it struck me as a very ambiguous way to run a railroad. If someone copied an order incorrectly, your day could end badly. I worked with my share of Conductors that were only qualified to lick windows...you put alot of faith in morons sometimes.
I'm glad I worked in CTC territory for most of my brief career, still dangerous, but you had a 'guardian angel' sitting behind a computer keeping an eye on the train set.
|
|
|
Post by tjmfishing on May 10, 2014 22:09:25 GMT -5
This was all dark buddy...all dark. The extra in the siding tried radioing either train and couldn't reach them. Campbellton couldn't either. The dispatchers in C'ton learned of the outcome by looking across the bay and seeing thick black smoke to the east.
Your only fear was the master mechanic in those days. No one liked him, no one, and he used to hid in the woods at crossings with the radar gun. One day he was pacing a freight at the west end of the line in a 40mph zone in the company truck and the Surete charged him with speeding
|
|