CLEANUP EFFORTS UNDERWAY AFTER TRAIN DERAILMENT AT HIGHWAY 36, NEW WEHDEM ROAD
Authorities responded this (Tuesday) morning to a train derailment south of Brenham.
The derailment was reported shortly after 9:30 a.m. at the railroad crossing located at Highway 36 South and New Wehdem Road.
According to DPS Sergeant Justin Ruiz, approximately 17 train cars left the track, all of them carrying coal. The train had a total of 127 cars.
Washington County Emergency Management Coordinator Bryan Ruemke said there were no injuries and no hazards to the public.
One home in the area did lose power, and Bluebonnet Electric Cooperative was notified.
According to Ruemke, the crossing will be closed for “quite some time”, beyond today.
The public is asked to avoid the area while officials work to clear the scene.
BNSF will lead the investigation into what caused the derailment.
There has been a BNSF train, with the Engine running, parked on the tracks at Selhorst and S. Chappell Hill ST. for over two days.
It has been totally abandoned . I called the non emergency number for the Brenham police to have them check on the situation.
They notified BNSF but no one has shown up. With the recent derailment on Hy36, plus this problem, I would say that the railroad needs to ‘up their game’. How do you leave a train running and disappear ???
For starters if would help if you had even a rudimentary understanding of how railroads and locomotives worked. 1) It’s not “abandoned”: railroad locomotives need to be left running to keep the air brakes charged. If the locomotive is shut off, the brakes gradually lose air pressure and the train could roll away (think Lac-Mégantic). You want that? Hand brakes are only a supplemental method.
2) Every Class 1 locomotive, BNSF, UP, CSX, NS, CPKC, et al; in the United States has GPS tracking. The railroad is receiving information via datalinks from that locomotive continuously. Some are even equipped with live feed video inside and out.
3) The cab of the locomotive is sealed and locked, and electrical switches isolated. Operating a locomotive is not like getting in a car, turning a key putting it in gear and driving away. Certain switches and levels must be placed into certain combination of order to make the train able to move.
4) The railroads make every attempt to give as many employees the holidays off. Since the train was sitting over Christmas (remember that – its a holiday) tells me it non-priority and therefore a crew be assigned soon.
5) The US railroad system is so vast, that it is totally and completely unfeasible to take all the trains without a crew and “laying over” off the line in between origin and destination and stick ’em in a yard. So they are parked on a siding. Sometimes there is no room in the yard either.
Trust me when I say, the railroad knows exactly where that train is, how long its been sitting there.
Merry Christmas
Thank you, Mr. Goldstein, for your educational narrative on locomotives. I am certainly not an expert. Other than the constant roar of the motor, and the noise from the release of the air brakes every few minutes for almost three days and nights, there was concern for the welfare of the engineer. Perhaps he could have had a heart attack ? Next holiday, that non-priority train can travel 1/2 mile further and leave it running at it’s non- priority location. So, Happy New Year ! I am going to catch up on the sleep I lost from the noise.
My husband is a retired railroad car inspector (40 years in Houston). I showed him the video posted on Rusty Surette’s FB page showing the few seconds before the derailment happened. The RR FRA would be prudent to look at that because it visually shows where, when and how this occurred. Apparently the day before, according to a viewer on Surette’s page, a maintenance crew were working on the rails. In the video one can see where and when the section of the train uncoupled at that rail spot causing the derailment. Seems the maintenance crew has some explaining to do. Fortunately for all, no one was injured.
Unable to find the video on Rusty’s page.
I’m wondering if he may have taken it down per the request of the FRA (Federal Railroad Administration).
This could have been like the accident in Pennsylvania. How many time of day does the train run and how many cars does it pull? Could happen here to.
BNSF was working on the tracks right there YESTERDAY!!
I’m curious: Why do you think there might be a conspiracy and for what purpose?
These crews are union with good benefits. They will have to answer to the FRA (and their union) about their work performance on the rails the day before this happened. I doubt any of them would want to be fired. I do not believe this was conspiratorial. IMHO very poor & dangerous work ethics.