7 ms·

Has anyone seen a good analysis on what went wrong? I found a USAToday article with a partial fragment saying that one of the wheels had a failed bearing, and t

Has anyone seen a good analysis on what went wrong? I found a USAToday article with a partial fragment saying that one of the wheels had a failed bearing, and this was the proximal cause of the derailment. It seems to me that (as pointed out in the article) the mean-time-to-failure increases with the length of the train; perhaps nonlinearly? I think the failure rate of bearings is proportional to the length of the train, but you can't "amortize" failure: any failed bearing would lead to a catastrophic error? To my mind this means that things like ECP (which have been removed) might've fixed the issue, but the fundamental problem is the train length, which has been discussed (in all of its negatives) here, before. In that sense, the train company is directly at fault: they are engaging in unsafe practices in order to remain profitable, and the practices are fundamentally not safe-able (to make up a word).

hammock 4y ago
There are thousands of derailments every year. The bigger problem is not the derailment but the fact that they released and burned off the vinyl chloride in order to expeditiously clear the tracks and get them running again, at great health and environmental cost to the local community and even several states in the windshed to the northeast (PA, NY, VT)
- xadhominemx 4y ago
  They burned off the vinyl chloride because the combustion products are relatively benign, it was much safer to remediation personnel to ignite the chemicals in a controlled burn vs having them work around flammable chemicals for weeks, vinyl chloride is quite volatile and acute exposure to high concentrations of vinyl chloride vapor is dangerous, and they wanted to get everyone back in their homes (and yes, get the railroad back up and running) as quickly as safely permissible.
  - hammock 4y ago
    >the combustion products are relatively benign Who told you that? Phosgene and dioxins are "relatively benign"? Dioxins might more properly be called forever chemicals, and will contaminate the soil and water of five states for decades. I understand they were trying to avoid a bleve. The solution they chose was not based principally on minimizing citizen harm though
    - mindslight 4y ago
      I haven't seen anything concrete about dioxins coming from the burning of vinyl chloride. From what I've seen, the known dioxin problem is from the burning PVC, which was in bulk cars that were ignited by the derailment (as opposed to deliberately set on fire). FWIW Only one vinyl chloride car was listed as leaking. I would think the alternative was to bring in mobile pumps, new tanker cars, and possibly chillers. And that should probably be made the default standard, rather than defaulting to "controlled" release in an emergent situation.
      - mrguyorama 4y ago
        Someone else a few days ago linked a paper that measured minuscule amounts of dioxins from burning vinyl chloride. Minuscule as in measurable, but probably not a concern.
    - xadhominemx 4y ago
      Phosgene also has very low environmental persistence. I think the actual amount of dioxin created from combustion of vinyl chloride monomer at atmospheric pressure is very low. In any event, both were dispersed into the atmosphere at concentrations that pose(d) very little danger to people outside of the temporary evacuation zone.
      - hammock 4y ago
        I stand corrected. They did a great job and no one in East Palestine is sick
        xadhominemx 4y ago
        That is correct. Not a single person in East Palestine was hospitalized.
        panny 4y ago
        I just wanted to follow up here. Yes, people have been hospitalized. Would you care to revise your statement? https://twitter.com/StatusCoup/status/1629530227146731521 https://twitter.com/StatusCoup/status/1629530227146731521
  - treeman79 4y ago
    https://youtu.be/L1I6eVP8QQk https://youtu.be/L1I6eVP8QQk Rivers are filled with something that’s heavier than water. Fish are all dying.
    - Blackthorn 4y ago
      Same from a video a friend took yesterday, but he didn't even need to disturb the creek, it just had the sheen on top right there.
    - xadhominemx 4y ago
      Fish are extremely sensitive and die off all the time from levels of contamination that don’t pose much concern for people.
    - ImPostingOnHN 4y ago
      iron oxidizing bacteria often produce that sheen when disturbed one way to tell is if the sheen, when itself disturbed, stays broken into pieces (bacteria) or rejoins together (oily)
  - ashwagary 4y ago
    >it was much safer to remediation personnel to ignite the chemicals in a controlled burn vs having them work around flammable chemicals for weeks It would have taken weeks for a large org like Norfolk Southern to unload the payload to other containers? Seems like an unreasonably long amount of time.
  - Eigenstate 4y ago
    > the combustion products are relatively benign If you consider phosgene and HCl to be "benign" based on their half life sure, but this assumes complete combustion. The cloud of visible black smoke emitted shows that clearly didn't happen. Partially combusted vinyl chloride monomer is some horrible mix of carcinogens that will contaminate the area for years.
    - xadhominemx 4y ago
      Nah
- schiffern 4y ago
  >and even several states in the windshed to the northeast (PA, NY, VT) My understanding is that contemporaneous weather radar[0] put the plume southeast at the time of the burn. [0] https://www.wdtn.com/news/ohio/east-palestine-train-derailment-fire-was-visible-on-pittsburgh-radar/amp/ https://www.wdtn.com/news/ohio/east-palestine-train-derailme...
  - hammock 4y ago
    That is good info, thanks for sharing. Here is the model that NOAA created - and which has not been officially released to the public yet: https://twitter.com/FalconryFinance/status/1625872327568420864 https://twitter.com/FalconryFinance/status/16258723275684208...
    - schiffern 4y ago
      Thanks, I had not seen that. On the journalism side, the source seems to be extremely alarmist,[0] so I doubt much skepticism was practiced there. On the NOAA side, it would be interesting to see the full set of assumptions behind this model. I would presume the vast majority of emissions would occur during the burn itself (February 6th, afternoon), but this model seems to assume a significant (undiminished?) outflow at midnight on February 8th. "Garbage in, garbage out." [0] https://twitter.com/FalconryFinance/status/1625875297483763712 https://twitter.com/FalconryFinance/status/16258752974837637...
- naasking 4y ago
  > There are thousands of derailments every year. The bigger problem is not the derailment [...] I think that's a problem worth discussing as well. Obama passed legislation to upgrade trains braking systems to make them a lot safer, which was then weakened by lobbying, which was then repealed by Trump, then the rail companies spent billions in stock buybacks and tried to tighten the screws on their labour force even further for cost-cutting reasons. There are a lot of pathological behaviours that have gone into "thousands of derailments per year" that are worth discussing, and I'd say those are a lot more important than just this one derailment.
  - bombcar 4y ago
    The way to put the screws to the rail companies isn’t to regulate better brakes - just have the NTSB have a policy of shutting down any line that has a derailment for months or longer. The companies will solve it themselves.
    - katbyte 4y ago
      Fine them millions per derailment. Increasing with each one.
      - bombcar 4y ago
        This can work but they can fight fines, or eat it as cost of business. Much harder to argue against a safety-shutdown.
    - clcaev 4y ago
      The rail companies are "too big to fail" since they are core national logistics.
      - katbyte 4y ago
        Then maybe they shouldn’t be private companies that cut corners for profit putting both people and that logistical operation at risk.
      - 4y ago
- SkyPuncher 4y ago
  > fact that they released and burned off the vinyl chloride in order to expeditiously clear the tracks and get them running again I was under the impression that there was risk of a Boiling liquid expanding vapor explosion which would have been even more catastrophic than the "controlled" release and burn off.
dgrin91 4y ago
From what I read the NTSB has not started its investigation because their are waiting for the train cars to finish being cleaned up. After that they will begin and we'll get some preliminary findings and eventually final report
rootusrootus 4y ago
We know the bearing was on fire for 20+ miles before it derailed, and it passed through at least one hotbox detector in that condition without being detected. On average, such detectors are placed every 10-20 miles. The one in East Palestine spotted the problem but it was too late to prevent the derailment. Maybe a start would be to adjust regulation such that detectors need to be placed with higher frequency. ECP is a nice idea, but that's a last ditch effort and not a generalized solution.
- erentz 4y ago
  Do we know it was without being detected? I got the impression somewhere that it was ignored because they frequently are for a while due to lack of sidings of adequate length to stop in.
  - akira2501 4y ago
    The length of the siding shouldn't prevent you from using it. It should just require the main track to be signalled stopped for other traffic in either direction while you are occupying it during the set out procedure. If the train is long enough, this could be quite a long time if you have to dump and then rebuild working pressure in the brake system.
    - orbz 4y ago
      There’s also the possibility that mechanical parts will seize up (especially in the case of overheated bearings) and will be unable to get moving again if you stop.
      - katbyte 4y ago
        That is still better then a derailment of a train carrying toxic chemicals…
      - pixl97 4y ago
        I mean, if attempted to apply the same logic to driving your car I would say you should have your license taken away. They can always split the train and cart off the working cars to a siding, and then if need be drag the sparkler at low speed with little risk of derailment. Or worst, you bring in a crane and replace the bogie on a siding. Or any number of actions that don't start a statewide emergency. Talk about normalizing deviance in name of profits.
jabroni_salad 4y ago
They shipped the wheelset to DC for inspection but we haven't seen the report from that inspection yet. They are also going to inspect the actual site, but are waiting until the site is decontaminated. So we might get a good ruling on the bearing in the coming weeks but based on other reports that I have read (and I quite enjoy the industrial disaster genre of podcast/video) it will probably be a year or two before the full report is complete.
- puffoflogic 4y ago
  > are waiting until the site is decontaminated Right. It's all completely harmless and there's no risk to any residents, but the site is also too contaminated for investigators to make even a very brief visit. Makes sense to me.
Ericson2314 4y ago
https://homesignalblog.wordpress.com/2021/12/27/efficiency-and-the-decline-of-american-freight-railroads/ https://homesignalblog.wordpress.com/2021/12/27/efficiency-a... for the general issues. Uday is writing a senior thesis on this topic, I believe, which should be a great read.
twobitshifter 4y ago
The hotbox detector could have seen the bearing overheating and been ignored, or have malfunctioned or just not been sensitive enough to detect the problem when the train passed. It’s old tech that should have caught this in most cases. The even older tech solution would be adding a caboose on trains carrying hazardous materials. Maybe you don’t need a caboose today but someone watching cameras in a cube could do the same thing. ECP does not seem like a solution, and addressing how hazardous chemicals are moved is something that needs to be done.
qwertox 4y ago
This article contains a video of the defective train passing a webcam some miles before the derailment: https://www.post-gazette.com/news/transportation/2023/02/10/east-palestine-train-derailment-video-fire-axle-alert/stories/202302100070 https://www.post-gazette.com/news/transportation/2023/02/10/... I got to that page by reading this page: https://e40.github.io/2023-02-18-train-safety.html https://e40.github.io/2023-02-18-train-safety.html

hammock 4y ago

There are thousands of derailments every year. The bigger problem is not the derailment but the fact that they released and burned off the vinyl chloride in order to expeditiously clear the tracks and get them running again, at great health and environmental cost to the local community and even several states in the windshed to the northeast (PA, NY, VT)

xadhominemx 4y ago
They burned off the vinyl chloride because the combustion products are relatively benign, it was much safer to remediation personnel to ignite the chemicals in a controlled burn vs having them work around flammable chemicals for weeks, vinyl chloride is quite volatile and acute exposure to high concentrations of vinyl chloride vapor is dangerous, and they wanted to get everyone back in their homes (and yes, get the railroad back up and running) as quickly as safely permissible.
- hammock 4y ago
  >the combustion products are relatively benign Who told you that? Phosgene and dioxins are "relatively benign"? Dioxins might more properly be called forever chemicals, and will contaminate the soil and water of five states for decades. I understand they were trying to avoid a bleve. The solution they chose was not based principally on minimizing citizen harm though
  - mindslight 4y ago
    I haven't seen anything concrete about dioxins coming from the burning of vinyl chloride. From what I've seen, the known dioxin problem is from the burning PVC, which was in bulk cars that were ignited by the derailment (as opposed to deliberately set on fire). FWIW Only one vinyl chloride car was listed as leaking. I would think the alternative was to bring in mobile pumps, new tanker cars, and possibly chillers. And that should probably be made the default standard, rather than defaulting to "controlled" release in an emergent situation.
    - mrguyorama 4y ago
      Someone else a few days ago linked a paper that measured minuscule amounts of dioxins from burning vinyl chloride. Minuscule as in measurable, but probably not a concern.
  - xadhominemx 4y ago
    Phosgene also has very low environmental persistence. I think the actual amount of dioxin created from combustion of vinyl chloride monomer at atmospheric pressure is very low. In any event, both were dispersed into the atmosphere at concentrations that pose(d) very little danger to people outside of the temporary evacuation zone.
    - hammock 4y ago
      I stand corrected. They did a great job and no one in East Palestine is sick
      - xadhominemx 4y ago
        That is correct. Not a single person in East Palestine was hospitalized.
        panny 4y ago
        I just wanted to follow up here. Yes, people have been hospitalized. Would you care to revise your statement? https://twitter.com/StatusCoup/status/1629530227146731521 https://twitter.com/StatusCoup/status/1629530227146731521
- treeman79 4y ago
  https://youtu.be/L1I6eVP8QQk https://youtu.be/L1I6eVP8QQk Rivers are filled with something that’s heavier than water. Fish are all dying.
  - Blackthorn 4y ago
    Same from a video a friend took yesterday, but he didn't even need to disturb the creek, it just had the sheen on top right there.
  - xadhominemx 4y ago
    Fish are extremely sensitive and die off all the time from levels of contamination that don’t pose much concern for people.
  - ImPostingOnHN 4y ago
    iron oxidizing bacteria often produce that sheen when disturbed one way to tell is if the sheen, when itself disturbed, stays broken into pieces (bacteria) or rejoins together (oily)
- ashwagary 4y ago
  >it was much safer to remediation personnel to ignite the chemicals in a controlled burn vs having them work around flammable chemicals for weeks It would have taken weeks for a large org like Norfolk Southern to unload the payload to other containers? Seems like an unreasonably long amount of time.
- Eigenstate 4y ago
  > the combustion products are relatively benign If you consider phosgene and HCl to be "benign" based on their half life sure, but this assumes complete combustion. The cloud of visible black smoke emitted shows that clearly didn't happen. Partially combusted vinyl chloride monomer is some horrible mix of carcinogens that will contaminate the area for years.
  - xadhominemx 4y ago
    Nah
schiffern 4y ago
>and even several states in the windshed to the northeast (PA, NY, VT) My understanding is that contemporaneous weather radar[0] put the plume southeast at the time of the burn. [0] https://www.wdtn.com/news/ohio/east-palestine-train-derailment-fire-was-visible-on-pittsburgh-radar/amp/ https://www.wdtn.com/news/ohio/east-palestine-train-derailme...
- hammock 4y ago
  That is good info, thanks for sharing. Here is the model that NOAA created - and which has not been officially released to the public yet: https://twitter.com/FalconryFinance/status/1625872327568420864 https://twitter.com/FalconryFinance/status/16258723275684208...
  - schiffern 4y ago
    Thanks, I had not seen that. On the journalism side, the source seems to be extremely alarmist,[0] so I doubt much skepticism was practiced there. On the NOAA side, it would be interesting to see the full set of assumptions behind this model. I would presume the vast majority of emissions would occur during the burn itself (February 6th, afternoon), but this model seems to assume a significant (undiminished?) outflow at midnight on February 8th. "Garbage in, garbage out." [0] https://twitter.com/FalconryFinance/status/1625875297483763712 https://twitter.com/FalconryFinance/status/16258752974837637...
naasking 4y ago
> There are thousands of derailments every year. The bigger problem is not the derailment [...] I think that's a problem worth discussing as well. Obama passed legislation to upgrade trains braking systems to make them a lot safer, which was then weakened by lobbying, which was then repealed by Trump, then the rail companies spent billions in stock buybacks and tried to tighten the screws on their labour force even further for cost-cutting reasons. There are a lot of pathological behaviours that have gone into "thousands of derailments per year" that are worth discussing, and I'd say those are a lot more important than just this one derailment.
- bombcar 4y ago
  The way to put the screws to the rail companies isn’t to regulate better brakes - just have the NTSB have a policy of shutting down any line that has a derailment for months or longer. The companies will solve it themselves.
  - katbyte 4y ago
    Fine them millions per derailment. Increasing with each one.
    - bombcar 4y ago
      This can work but they can fight fines, or eat it as cost of business. Much harder to argue against a safety-shutdown.
  - clcaev 4y ago
    The rail companies are "too big to fail" since they are core national logistics.
    - katbyte 4y ago
      Then maybe they shouldn’t be private companies that cut corners for profit putting both people and that logistical operation at risk.
    - 4y ago
SkyPuncher 4y ago
> fact that they released and burned off the vinyl chloride in order to expeditiously clear the tracks and get them running again I was under the impression that there was risk of a Boiling liquid expanding vapor explosion which would have been even more catastrophic than the "controlled" release and burn off.

dgrin91 4y ago

From what I read the NTSB has not started its investigation because their are waiting for the train cars to finish being cleaned up. After that they will begin and we'll get some preliminary findings and eventually final report

rootusrootus 4y ago

We know the bearing was on fire for 20+ miles before it derailed, and it passed through at least one hotbox detector in that condition without being detected. On average, such detectors are placed every 10-20 miles. The one in East Palestine spotted the problem but it was too late to prevent the derailment. Maybe a start would be to adjust regulation such that detectors need to be placed with higher frequency. ECP is a nice idea, but that's a last ditch effort and not a generalized solution.

erentz 4y ago
Do we know it was without being detected? I got the impression somewhere that it was ignored because they frequently are for a while due to lack of sidings of adequate length to stop in.
- akira2501 4y ago
  The length of the siding shouldn't prevent you from using it. It should just require the main track to be signalled stopped for other traffic in either direction while you are occupying it during the set out procedure. If the train is long enough, this could be quite a long time if you have to dump and then rebuild working pressure in the brake system.
  - orbz 4y ago
    There’s also the possibility that mechanical parts will seize up (especially in the case of overheated bearings) and will be unable to get moving again if you stop.
    - katbyte 4y ago
      That is still better then a derailment of a train carrying toxic chemicals…
    - pixl97 4y ago
      I mean, if attempted to apply the same logic to driving your car I would say you should have your license taken away. They can always split the train and cart off the working cars to a siding, and then if need be drag the sparkler at low speed with little risk of derailment. Or worst, you bring in a crane and replace the bogie on a siding. Or any number of actions that don't start a statewide emergency. Talk about normalizing deviance in name of profits.

jabroni_salad 4y ago

They shipped the wheelset to DC for inspection but we haven't seen the report from that inspection yet. They are also going to inspect the actual site, but are waiting until the site is decontaminated. So we might get a good ruling on the bearing in the coming weeks but based on other reports that I have read (and I quite enjoy the industrial disaster genre of podcast/video) it will probably be a year or two before the full report is complete.

puffoflogic 4y ago
> are waiting until the site is decontaminated Right. It's all completely harmless and there's no risk to any residents, but the site is also too contaminated for investigators to make even a very brief visit. Makes sense to me.

Ericson2314 4y ago

https://homesignalblog.wordpress.com/2021/12/27/efficiency-and-the-decline-of-american-freight-railroads/ https://homesignalblog.wordpress.com/2021/12/27/efficiency-a... for the general issues. Uday is writing a senior thesis on this topic, I believe, which should be a great read.

twobitshifter 4y ago

The hotbox detector could have seen the bearing overheating and been ignored, or have malfunctioned or just not been sensitive enough to detect the problem when the train passed. It’s old tech that should have caught this in most cases. The even older tech solution would be adding a caboose on trains carrying hazardous materials. Maybe you don’t need a caboose today but someone watching cameras in a cube could do the same thing. ECP does not seem like a solution, and addressing how hazardous chemicals are moved is something that needs to be done.

qwertox 4y ago

This article contains a video of the defective train passing a webcam some miles before the derailment: https://www.post-gazette.com/news/transportation/2023/02/10/east-palestine-train-derailment-video-fire-axle-alert/stories/202302100070 https://www.post-gazette.com/news/transportation/2023/02/10/... I got to that page by reading this page: https://e40.github.io/2023-02-18-train-safety.html https://e40.github.io/2023-02-18-train-safety.html