Rail Road Risk

[Silent Earth]

I think we are all familiar with the benefits of mapping all the rail routes live and abandoned in your are as pedestrian bug out routes. Rail tracks always follow the flattest routes so make getting out of Dodge on foot generally easier. BUT there is ONE negative to rail lines and that is if you live to close to a live Freight Carrying line. If your home is within a hundred meters of a rail track its often prudent to try and find out what traffic it carries. Minerals, Parcels, aggregates etc are one thing, but oil, gas, petrol, methanol, fertiliser trains are another because as seen with this video if it falls off the track the effects can be devastating

http://news.sky.com/story/1428796/oil-train-blast-like-atomic-bomb-went-off

 

[bigpaul]

all the branch lines in my area were closed down by Dr Beeching in the 60s and have since been made into cycle paths, unfortunately not all of them join up so you have to come off the end of one onto a sometimes main road to join the next bit. the main line is miles away and goes along the coast..remember Dawlish last winter??

 

[Brent S]

I think we are all familiar with the benefits of mapping all the rail routes live and abandoned in your are as pedestrian bug out routes. Rail tracks always follow the flattest routes so make getting out of Dodge on foot generally easier. BUT there is ONE negative to rail lines and that is if you live to close to a live Freight Carrying line. If your home is within a hundred meters of a rail track its often prudent to try and find out what traffic it carries. Minerals, Parcels, aggregates etc are one thing, but oil, gas, petrol, methanol, fertiliser trains are another because as seen with this video if it falls off the track the effects can be devastating

http://news.sky.com/story/1428796/oil-train-blast-like-atomic-bomb-went-off

I was an EMT many, many years ago. They drilled into us a lot about personal safety. With all the traffic, both trucking and rail, it's not if, but when a toxic accident happens. The best I can say is to put as much distance as you can between your family and an accident like this as quickly as you can. You can always return later for stuff.

 

[Silent Earth]

Yeah my wife had a friend who was a Paramedic, he attended a van crash on the A66 but did not know it was leaking some sort of corrosive acid vapour, poor sod breathed in in and it burned his lungs, he died from the effects not long after.

 

[Brent S]

Yeah my wife had a friend who was a Paramedic, he attended a van crash on the A66 but did not know it was leaking some sort of corrosive acid vapour, poor sod breathed in in and it burned his lungs, he died from the effects not long after.

One of the things they stressed was everyone wants to be a hero in an emergency. And that's fine if you do it once or twice. But if you stick your neck out, without being careful and cautious, on a daily basis, you tend to be a dead hero. I don't argee with a lot of the policy makers in our govt., but I have to admit, I have an incredible amount of respect for our health, fire and police workers. These people put it all on the line way too often for us.

 

[Silent Earth]

Our paramedics are always getting attacked when they respond to druggies and alcs. The Medics go to help them and the druggies turn on them.

 

[bigpaul]

happens with the fire service too, some little scroat sets a fire and when the fire engine turns up it is attacked by "Yuffs" throwing rocks!!

 

[jimLE]

i heard about yesterdays derailment..situations like that is something to worry about..you not have to worry about the derailment,the spill and fire.(if there is a fire)..but you also have to worry about the people who show up to see it and check it out.on account they might end up blocking your only safe route out of there..then there's the ones who's looking for a 5 finger discount..