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Frozen Train Tracks? Set 'Em on Fire (theatlantic.com)
It might look dangerous, but flames have kept switches moving and rails intact for a century. From a report: As if the horrors of the polar vortex were not already enough -- temperatures that look like typos, Canada Goose robbers, and something called frost quakes -- the nation's railroad system took a turn for the apocalyptic this week, too. Rails broke in three different places between Baltimore and Washington on Thursday, causing severe delays. Amtrak canceled dozens of trains passing through Chicago, and viral videos appeared to show commuter tracks in the city on fire. Of course, the tracks themselves were not burning -- they are made out of steel, prized for its tendency to rarely go up in flames. But the sight is still dramatic. The videos of the fires in Chicago last week show flames smoldering in patches of melted snow around the tracks.
Fires have been employed on railroads -- and remained the preferred fix for many a winter hazard -- for most of their roughly two-century history. While railroads have developed impressive tools for dealing with snow on the tracks, extreme temperatures remain a challenge. Though steel is flame-resistant, it's subject to cold, which can jam up railroads' many moving parts. When cold weather does wreak havoc on railroads, lighting fires on train tracks can serve a couple of uses. One is to thaw the switches that determine which track a train goes down, which is what Metra, the Chicagoland commuter-rail authority, said was going on this week. Switches are moving parts, and if ice gets into them, they can freeze in place. There are various types of switch heaters, which might use electric current or gas to melt ice -- or even an open gas flame, which is what's appearing in the Metra videos. Where there aren't switch heaters, crews might use temporary torchlike devices with a flame, the railroad equivalent of the smudge pots farmers use to keep citrus groves and apple orchards from freezing on cold nights.
Fires have been employed on railroads -- and remained the preferred fix for many a winter hazard -- for most of their roughly two-century history. While railroads have developed impressive tools for dealing with snow on the tracks, extreme temperatures remain a challenge. Though steel is flame-resistant, it's subject to cold, which can jam up railroads' many moving parts. When cold weather does wreak havoc on railroads, lighting fires on train tracks can serve a couple of uses. One is to thaw the switches that determine which track a train goes down, which is what Metra, the Chicagoland commuter-rail authority, said was going on this week. Switches are moving parts, and if ice gets into them, they can freeze in place. There are various types of switch heaters, which might use electric current or gas to melt ice -- or even an open gas flame, which is what's appearing in the Metra videos. Where there aren't switch heaters, crews might use temporary torchlike devices with a flame, the railroad equivalent of the smudge pots farmers use to keep citrus groves and apple orchards from freezing on cold nights.
So lighting the tracks on fire, is a standard way of solving frozen tracks... While we all love to see fire, and it often an interments of destruction, a controlled fire, has its benefits too.
Did you also know fire fighters who are trying to stop forest fires from spreading, may actually control burn parts of the forest, to isolate it from spreading?
So fire melts Ice, or is this a conspiracy from big fire companies, who have been manipulating mankind for the last 2 million years.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
Steel beams and all...
up 12 days, 22:30, 2 users, load averages: 993.20, 994.21, 994.56
*makes note to limit user processes...
Speaking as an Atlanta native, we are well aware that Northerners have plenty of experience heating up railroad tracks.
The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for it to be pitted against a slightly greater evil
i have been assured that we are in the post-industrial 3d printed future
why do we care about a 19th century series of trains?
...to get a truck started in the Yukon once. It's not an unheard of practice in rural Canada, particularly with older diesels.
Speaking as an Atlanta native, we are well aware that Northerners have plenty of experience heating up railroad tracks.
Yeah maybe you'll think about not owning slaves sooner next time and then you could get over a bitch slap that happened 150 years ago.
I want this for my driveway.
These are gas burners under the switches. They run them every winter to keep the tracks from getting ice locked.
You do, of course, realize that destroying the tracks was merely an act of genocide. It was a deliberate, malicious act to destroy the economy in order to weaken the southern culture *after the war*. No different than the tens of thousands of republican carpetbaggers sent to make sure that the southerners could not have any political power.
Yes, it was an attempt at genocide, and yes, it continues today.
Those tracks in Chicago are flaming like that through most winter storms. Somebody decided it was newsworthy because of the severe cold. However, it's nothing new.
It's like saying a storm is bad because lightning hit the Sears Tower.
One of our competitors trademarked the term "hypothesis". From now on, we will call them "boneheaded ideas".
"Polar vortex" what-ever.
That weather is just called "winter".
The fact that you've so much lost the habit of it that some occasionnal slight return to older typical warther is suddenly newsworthy is more a sign of how awful the climate change has become !
Now insert some grumbling about up-hill in the snow both ways and about lawns.
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
No way this could go wrong!
And here I thought that underground refuges would be the last bastions against the Big Freeze ...
"Ahh! I see you're in that indeterminate Schrodinger state where - oh, uh
It seems people are now forgetting that it gets cold in the winter.
Those in Chicago especially. It's also bad in New England where they make excuses for their lack of budget for snow removal. "It never gets this bad."
Yes it does, people just seem to blot out the bad in favor of those nice hot and humid summers.
Using gas jets to keep track switches from bindings isn't something new.
I'm still finding out about the goose robbers.
I've had jobs that seemed like that every day.
Chicago Born and Raised. Seeing tracks on fire during the winter is pretty common. I honestly thought this was common practice.
~ Mooga
The Dutch rail system has a large number of gas-heated points. Their fires kept getting blown out, so they're being phased out in favor of electric heaters.
>Rails broke in three different places between Baltimore and Washington on Thursday, causing severe delays.
Magneto was spotted leaving the area, surrounded by a dozen large robots.
https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/...
I dont have a dog in this fight. i am neither black nor white and recent immigrant to US but the Northerners were not fighting out of the pureness of their hearts. The northern economy was based on manufacturing for which they needed cheap factory labor. One large available source was freed slaves. hence they wanted to abolish slavery to give a boost to their manufacturing. At the same time they wanted high tariffs to protect their factories from European imports. The Southern economy was on the other hand based on agricultural plantations which needed both slaves to run and export markets in Europe so the Southerners were against abolishing slavery and for low tariffs (tariffs are generally mutual - if you put high tariffs on European imports they will put high tariffs on Southern exports). The country basically had 2 economies and each needed a different handling from the center. So the Southerners decided to go their separate way which was their right under the Constitution as understood at that time.
This is not very dissimilar from Brexit however I don't see a European army invading Britain to keep it in the EU.
**Life is too short to be serious**
what? where?
And nerd usually read more about the subject (not on slashdot) so they have better criticize of these - ready made answer.
on topic: what about the other intact building that collapsed next to it? what about the near free-fall collapse, explosion witness by dozen underground?
anyway it will always stay hazy.
Switches with _any_ security, may that be isolated rails or axle-counters would be ruined, not to mention the modern switches have plastic rolling supports that would melt.
These were used, because the old steel plaques had to be treated with oil every day or every couple of days by hand, which costs a fortune.
So most modern railway companies use automatic electric heating when the temperature falls below a certain point. It's way cheaper than having to pay people to go there and heat them by hand.
In some countries, Belgium f.ex. they use gas heating if it's only one or a couple of switches.
PS: I have been a railway dispatcher for 40 years.
All those fires to prevent tracks from freezing over ... think of the carbon footprint. .... uhmm nevermind.
So in order to keep tracks from freezing, we add to global warming
How about environmental impact? Where are the people who would be concerned with the impact of C02 and other air polution. How about climate warming, literally....
...I was crazy for buying that flamethrower. Well, my railroad switches are working just fine...
All these posts talking about fire, but no one is discussing the truly important part; Canada Goose robbers.
What is a Canada Goose robber? Is it someone who robs Canadian Geese? Is it Canadian Geese who are robbers? If it is the former, who the hell would be crazy enough to attempt to rob those incarnations of pure evil?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
No matter how dense you are, this is /thread.
"Not to mention all the idiots who use words like boxen."
Anonymous Coward on Monday August 04, @06:49PM
It wasn't about slavery; it was about the Yankee's deliberate destruction of the economy. Destroying the rails was an act of economic warfare, to ensure that the vassal states could not rebuild and liberate themselves.
The roads are used by both tax payers and heavy commercial trucks of the 80,000 lb class. The damage done by on truck equals the wear and tear of some 9000 private cars. The cost of road and bridge project to accept 80,000 lb trucks makes them so expensive. But they get massively subsidized by the tax payers.
But there is very strongly embedded idea among the people that railroads are tax subsidized white elephants, while the commercial trucks are the epitome of free market and competition.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
The plebes may not vote for freedom. Brexit will be squashed.
late 1940 to early 1950's where tolls at the state level of owner ship
TB12 is the greatest, bitcH
There are large parts of the country where we still use wooden ties.