Well, someone screwed up

http://worldnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/07/25/19661944-video-captures-high-speed-train-crash-in-spain-at-least-77-killed?lite

That sucks......and this one can be chalked up to stupidity.

How do you crash a train? It's like running an elevator, you don't even have to steer it. I may be a little bitter to begin with since someone rolled a freight train here last week so my commute home takes an extra hour plus.

by doing 118 in a corner that is rated for 49mph...

Touche madmachine

I understand that speed caused it, I mostly meant that your only job is to control the speed, how do you screw it up that badly.

Wally wrote: I understand that speed caused it, I mostly meant that your only job is to control the speed, how do you screw it up that badly.

the cute little stewardess?

Texting? Facebooking? Asking someone to hold his beer?

In reply to Wally:

The display was in MPH but the limit was in KPH? That'd berkeley some E36 M3 up.....

Yea, we've had numerous train/subway crashes here from texting drivers.

As a former employee of a rail transit company, I have a few comments that I have not heard addressed:

Most transit trains (was this transit?) run on automatic control. The guy is there in case something goes wrong.

All trains on any sort of railway have very good communication with a central station which directs traffic amongst other things. Did they not notify the drivers of their crazily excessive speed?

The drivers were in the cabs. This is VERY unusual. Generally the driver runs at the first notice of an impending accident. The brakes are not momentary in nature, you put them on and they stay on until you take them off. Generally, in this type of case, the driver would put the brakes on full emergency and take off running. If they can make it even one car back their chances of survival improve dramatically. *

Was there a brake failure? Again, the drivers should not have been in the cab either way. I suppose evidence is suggesting inattention in some way at this point based on those circumstances.

Something is not adding up. There are multiple safeguards against this very accident - how many failed? A terrible loss of innocent life, nonetheless, but I hope someone gets to the bottom of this mess.

• By the way, if you ever see a guy dressed in a transit uniform running while on a subway or train, follow him as fast as you can. Don't grab your bag, laptop, yell, or anything but grab your loved one(s) and run as fast as you can. There have been multiple cases where the driver is found one or two cars back, alive, where many in the front are dead.

In reply to tuna55:

Spain probably couldn't afford those systems........

z31maniac wrote: Asking someone to hold his beer?

This wasn't an Appalachian train.

yamaha wrote: In reply to tuna55: Spain probably couldn't afford those systems........

Wikipedia wrote: In Spain, Level 2 was commissioned on the Madrid-Barcelona high-speed rail line in October 2011, allowing the speed to be raised to 310 km/h (193 mph) with Madrid-Barcelona travel times reduced to 2 hours 30 minutes.[24]

The ETCS - the Eurozone can afford them.

In reply to tuna55:

You missed the jab at spain in general.....

That's horrible video to see.

Why are high speed lines such as this not using banked turns?

PHeller wrote: That's horrible video to see. Why are high speed lines such as this not using banked turns?

because pf physics!

Generally the limits are slowed for turns, as they appear to have been here. Banked tracks aren't as easy as you'd think for a number of reasons.

PHeller wrote: That's horrible video to see. Why are high speed lines such as this not using banked turns?

From what I've read elsewhere, when Spain added the high-speed rail, instead of building a whole new network, they linked it into the existing network in some places (i.e., here). Some of their newer trains have automatic speed control, some do not (i.e., this one).

So shortly before this was a 200kph section of track, and this section was rated for 80 kph.

davidjs wrote:

PHeller wrote: That's horrible video to see. Why are high speed lines such as this not using banked turns?

From what I've read elsewhere, when Spain added the high-speed rail, instead of building a whole new network, they linked it into the existing network in some places (i.e., here). Some of their newer trains have automatic speed control, some do not (i.e., this one). So shortly before this was a 200kph section of track, and this section was rated for 80 kph.

That's really strange if it's true, everything has automatic train control of some sort.

If that's true, the driver was either suicidal or stupid for having done, and then not run away from, that mess. Likewise, though, why didn't the control folks get on his case? They had to know it was happening, those guys get real time feedback. Too many things have gone too far wrong for that to be the whole story.

He previously posted pictures of train speedometers on Facebook bragging about how fast he was "driving."

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2377113/Spain-train-crash-video-At-78-people-killed-140-injured-Santiago-Compostela-derailment.html

It was a stunt, and people died. I hope they throw the book at him.

Sky_Render wrote: He previously posted pictures of train speedometers on Facebook bragging about how fast he was "driving." http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2377113/Spain-train-crash-video-At-78-people-killed-140-injured-Santiago-Compostela-derailment.html It was a stunt, and people died. I hope they throw the book at him.

if that's the reason for the crash (and it isn't necessarily based on that, those trains are fast, and maybe it was within limits at the time of the pic?) then he is stupid and suicidal. Criminally liable as well, for sure.

tuna55 wrote:

Sky_Render wrote: He previously posted pictures of train speedometers on Facebook bragging about how fast he was "driving." http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2377113/Spain-train-crash-video-At-78-people-killed-140-injured-Santiago-Compostela-derailment.html It was a stunt, and people died. I hope they throw the book at him.

if that's the reason for the crash (and it isn't necessarily based on that, those trains are fast, and maybe it was within limits at the time of the pic?) then he is stupid and suicidal. Criminally liable as well, for sure.

Nope, he was traveling 120 mph in a 50-mph zone.

Sky_Render wrote:

tuna55 wrote:

Sky_Render wrote: He previously posted pictures of train speedometers on Facebook bragging about how fast he was "driving." http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2377113/Spain-train-crash-video-At-78-people-killed-140-injured-Santiago-Compostela-derailment.html It was a stunt, and people died. I hope they throw the book at him.

if that's the reason for the crash (and it isn't necessarily based on that, those trains are fast, and maybe it was within limits at the time of the pic?) then he is stupid and suicidal. Criminally liable as well, for sure.

Nope, he was traveling 120 mph in a 50-mph zone.

Unbelievable. This is like 'Dr. Strangelove". A second driver was in the cab, what was wrong with him? What about the controllers? No automatic train control in a modern highspeed rail? This is crazy. If he really did cause all of this because he likes to go fast he ought to be tried for murder.

I was actually thinking "crime against humanity."

I heard on the news that the engineer phoned the office and said, "We are going 185 kmph and are going to derail."

An odd call from someone supposed to be driving the train. Maybe I mis heard.