When was crew alerted of issue in Ohio train derailment?

David Farwick, a 40-year veteran engineer of Norfolk Southern Railroad, said there are so many layers of safety in place in the rail industry.

[pop-pop-bill]

I am a locomotive engineer for a class 1 rail road. I'm afraid to tell you which one but let's just say my employer has been in the news a lot lately. When my employer decided to make the trains twice as long they ran into a snag. Periodically along the tracks are safety appliance called a hot wheel detector. The detector takes the temperature of the wheels and tells the crew if there's a problem via. radio Some examples would be sticking brakes, locked axles, hot bearings, hot wheels and sliding wheels. The snag was that the trains are so long there isn't anywhere we could stop the train without being on a road crossing or sitting directly on a detector. This would give us a hit from the detector and at which time the conductor would have to inspect the train. Inspecting a 2 mile long train and walking back to the head-end could take quite a bit of time and even longer in the winter. This meant delays and recrews. The problem with that was the furloughed so many of my co-workers there was no one left back home to come us. My employers solution to this problem was to simply remove every other detector. I can't say that this was the cause for the derailment in Ohio. But I am afraid to tell you that the ramifications from the get-rich-quick scheme called precision scheduled railroading will be with us for a long time.

[seanplace]

The rail industry is rife with neglected maintenance. Anything to save a few dollars.

[joelmartin]

Reports have the trains bearing going out about 20 minutes before it derailed ?!!!
That would be Gross negligence.
And no mention of the crew? Did they escape safely ? This catastrophic event is so hush hush

[sheristewart]

Shouldn't these failed parts be investigated by an independent party rather than Norfolk Southern, who may be tempted to report minimal to no fault on their part and avoid potential massive class actions lawsuit, to say the least?

[lastditch]

So the headline says "crews alerted" then the story says "it's unclear if crews were alerted".
What the f kind of nonsense is this?

[diamondsndregs]

One report showed the timestamps for both the video of the sparking wheel bearing when the car was in Salem, Ohio and the time of the derailment, and the difference was 43 minutes. It shouldn't take that long to detect that big a problem!

[toughtimes]

It's about time someone in the media covered this. They waited long enough. Too long!

[mikehalling]

In the old days (before cost cutting) trains used to have a caboose with crew that may have seen this trouble in time.

[garrymiller]

Feel sorry for the first responders who didn't know what was in the air.

[sidewayzmike]

Need to examine who overlooked the bearing

[JohnWickstyle]

Now they can say what ever they want after being done.

[sharsibley-gahnz]

You better come with some real truth because this "Accident"is Horrific...The consequences so far are Unbelievable 😠 Somebody do your job and help these People... NOW!!!!

[Ottos_ScLm_Race_videos__on]

Sparks that was flame shooting under the car.

[marathonlogistics]

East Palestine, RIP Rachel Corrie. 🙏 Even in China if there is negligence officials are help responsible and go to jail, why are corporations protected from responsibility

[jameshuffman]

Maybe bring back the caboose and crew!? Extra eyes like they used to have?

[thelonewrangler]

This is just another example of the American people wondering what's being done with all the money they spend and the taxes taken from it

[joshi]

A spark that poison a town, not faulty management. Right.

[chrisharper]

I was always under the impression that once a hot wheel/bearing is detected, the crew was to stop the train and the train was to be walked. I'm guessing the Brakeman would exit the locomotive and the Engineer would slowly pull the train forward while the Brakeman inspected the axles of each car as it passed/rolled by. Then the Brakeman would walk back to the locomotive. They are always in radio contact, as I recall. I'm guessing the e-brake occurred at the time of derailment as that likely caused the brake line to separate between cars. A sudden loss of brake pipe pressure will trigger an e-brake application automatically.

[tommytube]

It looked like the car was hopping, maybe check the track to see if the car was actually derailed and was hitting the ties?

[jusstmee]

20 miles prior is their version of moments before the derailment. Sickening how everyone is trying to cover this up. So much for the over trillion dollar infrastructure bill we are all forced to pay. I'm in phx where buttjagger is building 26 million dollar walking and bird bridge calling it an equity bridge. Wonder If 26 million can fix a wheel bearing on a train car. This is no accident and it's going to farmland. Our own government is purposely creating a food shortage so we All comply.