Low bridge

[MNgopher]

How could that happen? All railroad structures are built to height and width standards?

A lot of railroad infrastructure is old and as a result, not all of it is built to modern standards. Saw this firsthand many years ago when a doublestack intermodal train was sent down a track with inadequate clearance. The engineer was smart enough to slow down before it became a real issue...

Autoracks are also overheight - look at a locomotive hauling them and you will see the car is taller than the locomotive...

 

[kschachn]

A lot of railroad infrastructure is old and as a result, not all of it is built to modern standards. Saw this firsthand many years ago when a doublestack intermodal train was sent down a track with inadequate clearance. The engineer was smart enough to slow down before it became a real issue...

Autoracks are also overheight - look at a locomotive hauling them and you will see the car is taller than the locomotive...

I still don't understand that, even if all the bridges and overpasses that are along a route are older or not up to modern standards aren't they all known and cataloged? I'm going with the theory that there was something wrong with the lead car on that train or some unknown defect in the bridge. I can't imagine that nobody knew the height of that particular bridge yet dispatched the train anyway.

 

[MNgopher]

All I can say is when humans are involved, mistakes will happen. Without any context of where this is and what that rail lines purpose is, its all speculation. My bet is on some sort of spur or lead that typically handles lower car heights, but some reason autoracks were sent there... Put an autorack next to to standard cars and you will see the height difference...

 

[ABN_CBT_ENGR]

A lot of railroad infrastructure is old and as a result, not all of it is built to modern standards. Saw this firsthand many years ago when a doublestack intermodal train was sent down a track with inadequate clearance. The engineer was smart enough to slow down before it became a real issue...

Autoracks are also overheight - look at a locomotive hauling them and you will see the car is taller than the locomotive...

I can buy that totally IF ( and only if) this was the first time in the history of the track that an autorack car went down this path- then I could believe it was an unfortunate one off oversight.

If its not the "#1" then something was wrong with the ceiling or a car (s) ending with the domino effect

 

[MNgopher]

Kind of like Bobistheoilguy, there are places to turn to for info on incidents like this. Here is the info - as I was speculating, someone appears to have shoved a type of car down an industrial spur that does not normally handle these. See below and enjoy...


The train was shoving west down a CN industrial spur into Valero's Memphis refinery. The overhead line is CN's mainline between downtown Memphis and West Jct. Location: Lat. 35.085396/Long. -90.073772 FRA calls the small yard to the east of the bridge CN Cottonwood. The nearest street intersection is Riverport Road and W Mallory Avenue.

There is a small auto unloading facility about a half mile to the southeast. I suspect a yard job was doing some switching and inadventantly shoved the autoracks too far west.

https://www.google.com/maps/place/35%C2%B005'07.4%22N+90%C2%B004'25.6%22W/@35.0842185,-90.0781942,16.1z/data=!4m5!3m4!1s0x0:0x0!8m2!3d35.085396!4d-90.073772

You can find the autorack uloading place just south east of there at the NW corner of I55 and Kansas St - its small!

 

[ABN_CBT_ENGR]

Only takes one

 

[Yah-Tah-Hey]

Murphy is alive and well and waiting to say got ya.

 

[zzyzzx]

I can't view the liveleak video, so I will assume that it's the same as this one on YouTube:

 

[MNgopher]

Yep.. Same one.

 

[ollie]

I had to drive a 14' 6" load in the 90's from CA to DC. I did my own routing after I saw what Cal Trans did. They routed a high load locally and got someone killed. The driver was following a pilot driver and went under a bridge too low. In the end the driver was blamed. It was clearly a Cal Trans error. The pilot vehicles stick was too short.

After that I vowed to never trust a pilot vehicle. I personally measured every load and bridge myself after that.

 

[zzyzzx]

This famous bridge was just raised 8 inches:

 

[Chris142]

I had to drive a 14' 6" load in the 90's from CA to DC. I did my own routing after I saw what Cal Trans did. They routed a high load locally and got someone killed. The driver was following a pilot driver and went under a bridge too low. In the end the driver was blamed. It was clearly a Cal Trans error. The pilot vehicles stick was too short.

After that I vowed to never trust a pilot vehicle. I personally measured every load and bridge myself after that.

ca is one of the few states that allow 14ft instead of 13.6... There is a bridge near me in Oro Grande,Ca that is marked 13.11. Then they resurfaced the road so that now 13.6 trailers hit it.

 

[Tomioka]

This famous bridge was just raised 8 inches:

I swear all of the box truck drivers failing to see the warning don't have a CDL or half a brain cell. You don't need a CDL to drive a 26,000lb GVW 13'-6" tall 26' boxtruck but it pays to heed the clearance warnings.