# Fairmont MN Derailment



## gunrunnerjohn (Nov 10, 2010)

OOPS! I hope none of the Ethanol leaked out!


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## Lehigh74 (Sep 25, 2015)

Wouldn't want to be the guy taking the video. I think I would make a U turn real quick.


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## MichaelE (Mar 7, 2018)

Ooops...


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## rrman987 (Aug 29, 2021)

Saw this on CBS morning, but gave no location and never mentioned it further in newscast, so glad to see it here. Well shows a broken air hose emergency braking works as designed.... 
And looks just like my layout when some dumb car(s) decides to pick a turnout points!! Bet RR wished they a hand to come down and put cars on rails again.


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## Jscullans (Jul 8, 2019)

Pucker factor 11 for the camera man


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## Fire21 (Mar 9, 2014)

Pretty amazing that he maintained composure and got that on video!!


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## gunrunnerjohn (Nov 10, 2010)

I'd have been turning around and beating a hasty retreat! That's a lot of highly flammable stuff in all those cars, it's amazing that it wasn't a huge fire!


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## Dennis461 (Jan 5, 2018)

No, video takes priority. The rape on SEPTA in Philadelphia proved that.


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## J.Albert1949 (Feb 3, 2018)

Play it back at full screen.
Watch the first few seconds of the video.
Focus on the left, just to the right of the silver signal box.
Looks like a rail "tipped over", broke, or something like that.
You can see the trucks come off the good rail and onto the ground. Could be a fault in the rail, bad ties...

They drag along (probably because of tension in the train), and roll through the asphalt crossing.
Then, past the crossing (to the right), they're bumping along the ties again until one falls over.
The shelf couplers actually worked to make the derailment worse, pulling additional cars "over"...


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## rrman987 (Aug 29, 2021)

J.Albert1949 said:


> Play it back at full screen.
> Watch the first few seconds of the video.
> Focus on the left, just to the right of the silver signal box.
> Looks like a rail "tipped over", broke, or something like that.
> ...


Good observation, you can see the wheel kick out a tie onto the crossing. Whats amazing how the cars continued to roll along up and over the crossing, until after the crossing then finally fall over. I dread to think of the calamity if they had been running at speed. Wonder if train was already slowing down or if engineer felt a jerk or something that made engineer start slowing down. Loco black box will "see all, tell all", no doubt tied with the valuable video.
Certainly proved the crsh worthiness of the tankers at least at slow speeds.


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## JeffHurl (Apr 22, 2021)

Fire21 said:


> Pretty amazing that he maintained composure and got that on video!!


Yeah, I was getting anxiety just watching the video, lol!


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## highvoltage (Apr 6, 2014)

rrman987 said:


> Saw this on CBS morning, but gave no location and never mentioned it further in newscast, so glad to see it here. Well shows a broken air hose emergency braking works as designed....
> And looks just like my layout when some dumb car(s) decides to pick a turnout points!! Bet RR wished they a hand to come down and put cars on rails again.


Title of the video says Fairmont, Minnesota.


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## ncrc5315 (Jan 25, 2014)

Hence the reason you don't stop close to the rail crossing.


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