I havent been on here in like forever lol. How is everyone doing. I'm still working for hulcher services driving my truck to trail derailments. Some of you might remember me, i was the guy that knew it all lol.

 

Soooooo..... The Prodigal Son has returned!!

Good to have you back, MidnightLighting!! 8)

 

Yeah yeah i know lol. How have you been useles? Besides me kicking swift to the curb for sticking me with a rotten trainer i'm good

 

So, ML;

You say that you are working train derailments....

How does that work?? Do you travel to different parts of the country?? Is there a steady flow of work??

Sounds interesting..... Enlighten us!!

 

Welcome back Midnight. Sure sounds like an interesting job? Let's hear more about it?

You may want to re-think that Swift avatar. :wink: 8)

 

The company i work for is called hulcher professional services, we have divisions all over the usa and in canada and good ole mexico. The way it works is that for example say bnsf has derailment they call into a company called service interuption and they in turn call our dispatch center and dispatch calls the supervisor for that division and then he or she calls the crew to the shop were we get directions to the job and head out. We mainly use sidebooms also known as pipe layers to lift and winch cars and locomotives. We also have rubber tire loaders, 977 buckets, excavators, cranes, vac trucks, hazmat teams, you name it. I'm assigned to a 97 pete 378 which hauls the pole, weight rack and counter weights and a light plant and the travel blocks for the pole, and slings and chains. Its a adventure job thats for sure but fun at times too. Gotta love those 22 hour drives into canada eh. As far as travel our divsion in pasco, wa. we cover all of washington, oregon, nothern cal, parts of montana, and northwest of canada and all of idaho. We are in our slow months now, so lots of sanding and painting on equipment and just being wreck ready.

 

You get lost useless?

 

No, Midnight....

Not lost, just watching over my sick daughter, and trying to get over a very nasty respiratory infection that is viral in nature. (Very stubborn, too... this crap just does not want to let go!!) She became very ill right at the end of the school year, and she's been sich ever since school let out. I was up all night with her almost all of last night. So, while I've probably spent more time here at CAD in the past few days than I have in the past month, I am being kept busy, and trying to get some rest when I can.

Now, I do have a question for you:

You mentioned that you all were in a "seasonal slump". Are train derailments tied into seasons?? I was unaware of the fact that train derailments had a "busy season", or a "slow season". I'm thinking that derailments could be caused by something going wrong with the track.... would that be the results of flooding, snows, or other weather conditions??

You are doing something that I find quite interesting, but it is something that I know absolutely nothing about.

 

Yes they tend to happen in seasons per say like when the weather goes from hot to cold and cold to hot, of course as you know i'm sure heat expands and well cold retracts and becomes stiff. When rail to heated it flexs alot more than the naked eye can see and well when it freezes it just snaps in the weakest point from weight passing over it. Rail is a big factor in derailments but not the only cause, i.e snow build up on the rail and is compacted very bad, rail switches not switched all the way over is common too, And bad wheel bearings and wheels. Now the kicker is engineers running red lights and falling asleep and hitting other trains or just not watching what they are doing. I will never ride amtrak either.