How does one learn to drive a train?

[Shelby Griggs]

EMD, KAT or any other of you rail guys, this question is for you. Just wondering what the process is for becoming a train engineer, where do you start? Not really thinking of going for it, just have always wondered what the process was. What does a crew consist of these days? An engineer and conductor only, or is there additional people? What does the conductor do on freight trains?



Shelby

 

[swamp rat]

Easy, if you are an 8 year old whose Dad is a switchman for ICG RR before the G was added, and he has a really good friend who is an engineer and everyone keeps hush hush so the officials don't catch wind of it. If word had leaked out, I'm sure several men would have lost their jobs.

 

[Doc Tinker]

Like swap rat says, you probably gotta have family in the business. Isn't it that way for all the best jobs?



Doc

 

[EMDDIESEL]

I had wanted to be one since i was 4 years old. I live in the North east, and one thing about railroads, you have to be where they are. And there are not alot up here. When i hired for CSX in98' i had to move to DE for the job. I was hired as a conductor, then waited my turn in seniority to go to engineer school in Cumberland MD. The school is 5 weeks of classroom work, mainly operating rules, Air brakes, and method of operation. After that, 16 weeks of on the job training, assigned to a licensed engineer who supervises you. Then, you have 3 qualifying runs on your division. A road foreman rides with you and watches everything you do, and asks you LOTS of questions. For example, when i qualified between Philedelphia Pa and South Kearny NJ which is 112 miles, i had to know every road crossing, grade, bridge, culvert, speed restriction and defect detector. Plus the names off all the sideings and the correct radio channel to use. It seems overwhelming, but its like when you first leared to drive a car, hard at first, you brake too fast and a re generally sloppy, then after 16 weeks, it seems farily easy. Crews now are 3 people, that it, engineer and conductor. On local frieghts, we sometimes have a brakeman, but never on road trains. A conductor keeps track of all the paperwork, keeps track of Haz Mat locations, and when cars are to be picked up or set off, he gets off the engine and does the ground work. Some trains you juts get on in one place, take a few hundre miles and get off, on those runs, the conductor is just a secretary really, just checks the paperwork and then they are done. The only other thing they do is act as an extra set of eyes and if there is any problem with any cars in the train, they walk back and try and fix it. As an engineer, i am only responsible for the locomotives.

Before i hired on CSX i tried every possible way to become an engineer somewhere first, but there is NO place in the US that will train you to be FRA certified as an Engineer. Only railroads can do that. CSX does not hire off the street for engineers, you have to be a conductor first. And last i heard, the FRA is passing a law that says you have be a conductor for 5 years before you can go to engineers school. I know some railroads were hiring that way though, i believe BNSF and UP were, Kat's the western guy, he will know. Ill tell you what though, if you ever out here in the North east, i will take you for a ride and let you run. Any other specifics, Email me.

 

[cbconway]

EMDDIESEL,



When I was young I used to watch the last of the steamers come puffing through town (South Jersey). I was awestruck as only an 8-year-old can be. Even today I don't mind being stopped at a crossing, wondering where the cars are going & what it's like to drive the beast.



Keep tellin' us RR stories. I love it.

 

[HEMI®Dart]

You have a neat job EMD



I have a couple questions if you have time:



Have you ever had a close call with a car trying to beat your train across a vehicle crossing?



Have you ever slammed on the E-brake? How long does it take for the train to stop?



Do you wave to lots of people daily and get requests to honk the horn?

 

[Max340]

EMD, what routes do you run?

 

[tntway]

i'll second that...

EMD nad Kat--

i'll second what Cbconway said... keep the stories coming. RR's

a pisce of American history that is slowly disappearing. Too many of them big, smelly, loud probably Cummins-powered trucks running around. OMG--what am i saying??

 

[Jff24Gordn]

Its alot more fun driving a train that dont need tracks. Even if it is powered by a T444 and built on a international 4700 frame.





#ad
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[EMDDIESEL]

Ok, to answer the questions:



I have close calls fairly often with cars and trucks, id say a few a week. Generally though, people are pretty good about it. Those problems are alot more common in slow train speed areas where people have to wait a long time for the train to get to the crossing. Most of the places i work in have a 50mph speed so we are usually over at the crossing in about 20 seconds from the time the gates go down.

I have hit alot of other stuff, refrigerators, newspaper machines, shopping carts, garbage cans, logs, TV's, you name it, i have hit it. Also LOTS of deer, Oppussum, racoons and a dog. Thankfull no people yet, but i have come close.

The routes i work all start in Philedelphia. From there i run trains to South Kearny NJ, Baltimore MD, Cumberland MD, Hagerstown MD, Brunswick MD, and Richmond VA. plus everywhere in between And occasionally, to Albany NY. Usually they put you in a hotel when you get to the away terminal, you rest for 8-12 hours, then work another train back. Sometimes they put you in a taxi and take you right back.



I have "Dumped" (put in emergency) my train a few times. Once there was a tree across the tracks, it would'nt stop in time, we ended up hitting the tree but there was no damage. Another time i had just 7 engines, no train and signal went to red right in front of me. I dumped and stopped about 3 feet from the signal, that was the closest i ever came to going by a stop signal.

How fast will the train stop in emergency?

Depends on alot, how many cars, how heavy the train is, are you going downhill or uphill, is it humid or raining. what kind of Locomotives and how many, etc. An average would be a 5,000 ton train going 50mph on flat track in dry weather would take about 1. 5-2 miles to stop once you put it in emergency.

I do get alot of "requests" to blow the horn, mainly from kids and i do blow it for them. I let alot of railfans on too when i am stopped places and let them look around and sometimes blow the horn.

People love to throw stuff at trains too, rocks, bottles, paint cans, etc. I keep the windows closed most of the time to avoid that stuff. We had an engineer shot in Baltimore. Its pretty bad where i work. Not nice and pretty like where Kat Diesel dispatches.

 

[illflem]

EMD, was I causing any sort of problem laying pennys on the track as a kid?

 

[Doc Tinker]

I did that too, illflem. Back then though, a penny would buy a jawbreaker, so I didn't do it often.



I remember once, my buddy's german shepherd got hit by a train. My buddy didn't go with us when we went to look at the remains. That dog was scattered for half a mile. To a ten year old, it was very fascinating.



Another bud's mom always told us stories of his older brother, whom we never knew, got run over by a train. I'm sure it was a story to scare the crap out of us, so we'd stay off the tracks, but it didn't stop us.



We used to dare each other to stand under the trestle when the train went through. Nobody would do it because we were afraid the train would suck us up.



There are a lot of memories of life around the tracks. Like swimming in the creek, buck naked. Diving from a trestle. We used to drag big rocks to the creek, just below the trestle, to dam it up and make a nice swimming hole.



Doc

 

[KatDiesel]

Originally posted by EMDDIESEL

I have hit alot of other stuff, refrigerators, newspaper machines, shopping carts, garbage cans, logs, TV's, you name it, i have hit it. Also LOTS of deer, Oppussum, racoons and a dog. Thankfull no people yet, but i have come close.

Ever hit a trampoline????? I had a train hit one the other day.....



I'll start putting in some info soon... still sick.

 

[WOWZY]

Ill

I know what you're talking about!!



I wish I had all that money that I made in school all those years selling pennies that had been run over by a train for a buck each!!

 

[Doc Tinker]

Kat - how far did the train bounce? LOL



Doc

 

[Bad340fish]

Can't Be that Hard

C'mon guys it can't be that hard... hell you don't even have to steer All you have is GO and WHOA do deal with lol j/k.



A friend of mind got his truck stuck near some tracks at a Storage Yard(I Guess) A Locomotive was dropping a car off there and the Engineer tossed us some Chain and Pulled him out. Not to many people have been pulled out of the mud by a train lol.

Clark

 

[EMDDIESEL]

Pennies are harmless to trains. An average Locomotive is over 200tons, so there is very little you could put on there that would hurt it. USUALLY anything big enough to derail a locomotive is so big the locomotive plow will throw it out of the way. Even portable derails wont stop a loco moving faster then 20 mph. I saw a locomotive run over 2 derails, it broke both of them, snapped them like twigs. They are mainly for stopping frieght cars or SLOW moving locomotives. Alot of the moronic kids where i work put tires and rocks on the tracks. The rocks usually get shot out at high speedand sooner or later will hit one of the kids and kill them. Tires get stuck under the train and alot of the time will knock the trainline air hose between the cars apart and dump the brakes which is a pain in the A**.

 

[Andy Perreault]

I read a newspaper article about Cajon Pass, which leads down in to San Bernadino from the Mojave Desert in SoCal (I-15 from L. A. to Vegas runs through there, too). It was interesting learning about the skill involved in braking the train. A certain amount of braking is required to keep the speed down, but too much braking will use up too much air, and then the train must be brought to a stop while the locomotives refill the air system. It was about ten years ago when there was a Southern Pacific runaway that almost made it all the way down, but derailed on a curve and took out some houses. Some crewmembers were killed on that one. Then to make things worse, a few days later, a gasoline pipeline buried next to the tracks exploded.

Up here in Washington, along I-5 near Kelso, there is a memorial visible from the freeway to mark the spot where two trains hit head-on.

Here's an interesting side note: If your favorite baseball team happens to be playing in Seattle and you're watching the game on TV or listening to it on the radio, keep an ear open for train horns. The stadium was built on the site of an old railroad yard, and BNSF's main line runs right past the stadium, and I mean right past it! When the stadium's retractable roof is open, the roof is stored right above the tracks. There is a road crossing there, so the trains honk the horns. When they honk the horns under that roof, it's really loud! The train horns have kind of become a trademark of the Mariners and are part of the atmosphere of Safeco Field (I should have posted this before the All-Star game, but I didn't think about it at the time).

Andy

 

[EMDDIESEL]

The deal with the air brakes you are reffering to Andy is like this in simpler terms. To release the trains brakes, you send air into the "Trainline" which is the air pipe that goes form the engine to everycar. The longer the train, the longer this takes, also take into account leaks in pipes and hoses plus in cold weather, this takes ALOT longer.

Anyhow, when i a train is moving with the brakes released the Trainline generally has 90psi in it. That keeps the brakes in the released position. To apply the brakes, when you move the "Automatic brake" handle you let some air out of the trainline, the more you let out, the harder the brakes apply. But with the exception of Electronic brakes (which i wont get into hear since they are a bit complicated and still not used heavily yet) But its not like you cant just apply and realease them quickly, for example, with a 150 car train, if i make what is known as a 12psi or "Minumum" Reduction (Which means you let 12 psi out of the trainline, its called a reduction since you are REDUCING the air pressure in the trainline) it will take almost 40-50 seconds in warm weather for the rear brakes to start to apply since all the air is realeasing from the lead engine. So figure the air in a mile and a half train has to travel all that distance and then vent through a 1 1/4 pipe. That another reason why trains cant stop very quickly. Now, once you apply the brakes and you want to release them, you have to put air back into the trainline, again, all that air through that small pipe. All from how many air compressors you have on your engines. This takes alot of time too.

The reason it is so important to know what you are doing when running a train ESPECAILLY in Kats territory is once you move the brake handle to apply the brakes, say half way, the brakes will start to apply, half way. Even if you move the brake handle back right away to release, they wont, not untill they have applied the amount you initially moved the brake handle too. So, now you have to wait untill the air is done exhausting (Releasing from the Trainline). Now you can release the brakes (which if you rember means putting air back into the trainline). So here is the dangerous part and the cause of runaways caused by operator error. While the brakes are releasing each cars brake valve (too complicated to explain in this) is in the relaease position to allow air to go into the brakes to relaease them. While this is happeneing you cant reaplly the brakes, you HAVE to wait for them to be fully released before you can apply them again.

So what happens when an engineer screws up is say he is approaching a big hill and wants to slow the train down a bit for he starts down it, so he applies the brakes to slow the train, but if he misjudged the train weight and applies too much brake, the train will stop (which is what you are supposed to do, when in doubt, just stop) So the problem begins when instead of waiting for the brakes to fully apply to whatever postion he set the brake handle to, he just goes right to the release postion, now you are putting air BACK into the trainline, but the brakes never finsished applying, so it will take a while to finish "re charging" the air. While it is recharging, you have NO brakes, this may take as long as 5-10 minutes to fully charge. That is alot of time if you are about to start down a huge hill. NOW, if you did not wait too long to release the brakes you still can go into emergeny, so if you realise your mistake, DUMP IT right away and the train will usuallly stop. The runaways happen becasue engineers instead of going right to "Emergency" try to just apply the brakes the usual way again, if you try it, thinking you do have enough air in the system to allow you to reaplly them (remember, when you apply you get rid of all the air in the trainline) but you wee wrong, you now have NO air to apply the brakes, even in the emergency position, in other words, RUNAWAY TRAIN. It will take AT LEAST 10 minutes before you can try again, and 10 minutes is PLENTY of time to get up to 80 miles an hour and derail your train. Thats why running trains is not as easy as it looks. Only with expieience will you know how to judge when to apply and realease you brakes and how much.

The other cause of Runaways and the cause of that runaway on Caojn Pass is remember how all the air has to release from the locomotive to apply the brakes?, well if for some reason the air cant get from all the cars to the engine, those cars brakes wont apply, in other words, those cars have no brakes. On that Cajon Pass derailment, something was stuck in the trainline not far back from the engine, so the train had almost no brakes.

The FRA has since made 2 way EOT (end of train devices) mandatory on trains in areas like that. What that will do is allow you to dump the air from the last car of the train too. So if the blockage is in the middle of the train, you can vent half from the Locomotive, Half from the rear car, and you know have all you brakes. They are a great idea, that was just one of many accidents caused by blockages in the trainline. Ok, this is confusing enough, if you need clarification, let me know

 

[tntway]

how long?

will and kat-- how long have you guys been doin' this? will you still look pretty young...

that post on the brakes went way over my head. i'll stick to working in an operating room. the human body's alot less complicated of a system!!