Meteorology and Physics Analysis  of Rail Car Fatality

Drew Peake; Muhammad  Salman

doi:10.51501/jotnafe.v39i2.832

Authors

Drew Peake NAFE, Peake Engineering
Muhammad Salman https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7245-5157

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.51501/jotnafe.v39i2.832

Keywords:

borax, Rail car, Precipitation, shipping, ocean transport, rail transport, truck transport, center of gravity, lean angle, turning moments, suspension stiffness, forensic engineering

Abstract

When borax gets wet, it clumps. In this case, 76,000 pounds of previously wetted borax clumped on the inside of a rail car. The unbalanced load caused the rail car to fall on a yard worker, killing him. Tracking meteorological conditions in transit from Turkey to a port in Deleware, truck transit to a warehouse, handling at the warehouse, and rail transit to an interim transfer station was key to developing the origin and cause for the rail car derailing. There was evidence that clumping had rendered the product unusable by the end-user. However, this event occurred at the interim transfer station where the rail car product was transferred to trucks. This paper describes the process of determining how and where the borax absorbed moisture and shows physics that determined derailing was the result of an unbalanced load. This demonstrates the cause and effect of this event.

References

20 Mule Team Borax, Borate Caking: Understanding and Prevention, Boron, California, 2021.

C. Helvaci and R. Alonso, “Borate Deposits in Turkey and Argentina; A Summary and Geological Comparison,” Turkish Journal of Earth Sciences, vol. 9, pp. 1-27, 2000.

P. Withers, “Economic Geology of Death Valley,”Boston University, 2000. [Online]. Available: http://sirius.bu.edu/withers/pppp/pdf/dvminerals2000.pdf. [Accessed 30 January 2022].

H. Diamond, “Climate Science Program Manger at NOAA’s Air Resources Laboratory,” College Park, 2021.

National Environmental Satelite, Data, and Information Service, “Local Climatological Data, Daily Summary Wilmington New Castle Co Airport, DE,” National Center for Environmental Information, Asheville, 2013.

Taylor & Francis Group, CRC Handbook of Chemistry and Physics, D. R. H. W. M. Lide, Ed., Boca Raton: CRC Press, 2009-2010 at page 4-134.

“https://www.csx.com/index.cfm/customers/resources/equipment/railroad-equipment/,” [Online].