GP40-2 6206 rebuilt?

i saw 6206 in the Readville yard, and it was in the dark future paint scheme, it looked brand new, did CSX just rebuild it?

I believe it was re-painted a few months ago. Several of the GP40-2's have gone through a re-built project due to floor in cab rotting and other issues.

I do know that the 6206 was involved in a wreck at Readville in November of 2001 in which it was paired-up elephant style with the 6231. The 6206's handrails and front stairs were mangled on the engineer's side. Both units were towed to Selkirk by another GP40-2 a week or so later from Readville straight to Selkirk as a lite engine move. At least the 6206 survived.

dipped and shipped

What happened at Readville in November, 2001?

Did the two engines collide?

Paul

paulrail wrote:What happened at Readville in November, 2001?

Did the two engines collide?

Paul

B731 was switching their train for the RTe.128 industrial park and the 6206 & 6231 were in the crossovers from Freight Main 2 to the yard lead with about 15 or 20 cars when 8 loaded box cars of kitty litter for Foxboro Terminal rolled down the hill on Freight Main 2. A conductor trainee heard something and alerted the brakeman which was on the other side of the string of cars they were switching and at that time the engineer looked east and saw the cars coming toward him (both engines were facing east). The engineer tried to shove east to avoid a collision but there was too much wait and he couldn't get out of the runaways cars' path. Next thing you know they heard a very large boom and the lead box car had side-swiped the 6206 cornered the 6231, causing the damage seen in the photo linked above. Many people said the engineer should have pulled west so box cars could have hit boxcars to reduce the severity of the damage, but then again they might have done the same thing under the circumstances. In a way it is good that the 8 cars nevr got past B731 because if they had they would have gone past the red signal @ Transfer and when they reached the end of the lead parallel to Amtrak's main line (w/ a max timetable speed of 90mph), they would have blown through the skates at the end of the track and could have fouled track 2, with a passenger train passing as the incident happened at about 545/600pm on a MOnday night. In case you are wondering what caused the cars to get away.. It was determined that the brakes were not properly charged-up before the conductor made a cut on the 8 cars that he left behind after getting his cars for Home Depot. The conductor heard the cars "dump" after cutting away but since the brakes were not charged-up and re-applied properly there was enough air in the train-line still and the cold weather didn't help..........the brakes slowly bled off and at 100 tons per car away they went downhill. Fortunately nobody was hurt other than the engineer who had a slight sprain in the ankle from when he supposedly jumped out the window of the cab.

Wow! What an accident! It is incredible that nobody was killed or seriously injured.

Did this occurence ever get public notice, i.e., newspapers or any railroad or train magazines? If it did, I sure missed it!

Thank god everything ended up OK and nothing got out onto the corridor!

Thanks very much for posting this story of the accident, CSX COnductor.

Paul

Was the Conductor fired, or given another punishment?

paulrail wrote:Did this occurence ever get public notice, i.e., newspapers or any railroad or train magazines?

No, like most deerailments it was kept low-key. The funniest part was watching the Dedham & Boston Fire Depts argue as to who's juristiction the collision site fell under as Readville Yard is part of Boston & part of Dedham.

Engineer James wrote:Was the Conductor fired, or given another punishment?

The conductor went to engineer school a few months later. We all learned a valuable lesson about making sure the air was completely charged-up again before making a cut as there were many lectures of what transpired here. This was also less than a year after the runaway in upstate NY (Rochester?) where the crew bottled the air and the entire train got away downhill and wiped-out part of a marina.

What about 10% hand brakes? The cars I leave in the receiving yard will never roll away with ATLEAST ten%!! I love the new rules!! He He He.