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[video] Freight train VS Tornado

Cool.

reply to IllIlIlllIll
ummmmm.....

WOW

reply to IllIlIlllIll
Tornado 1 - Freight Train 0

Wow, crazy stuff. Almost expected an explosion when the tank car came up on the engine.

reply to IllIlIlllIll
That wasn't a tornado. It's winter time. Look at the trees, there are no leaves.

reply to Rich84

National Geo channel actually had a show on that outbreak, I caught it a few weeks ago. Wasn't only Arkansas that got nailed... "On February 5th 2008 Super Tuesday 57 people lost their lives as 87 tornadoes devastated 5 states. It was Americas deadliest tornado outbreak in nearly a quarter of a century."

»channel.nationalgeographic.com/e···Overview

reply to IllIlIlllIll
I got surprised twice there. I didn't think as Tornado could really lift a train of the tracks. Second, I forgot about the rest of the momentum from the cars that didn't get derailed---that tanker coming up quick looked scary.

reply to IllIlIlllIll
Didn't look like a tornado - strong gust of wind perhaps, but it didn't look like a tornado. Pretty impressive though!

it only "derailed" because it blew over. its a giant box, not exactly aerodynamic.... notice how the tank car had no problem going onward? if the whole train was cylindrical it wouldn't have happened.
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By all means marry. Get a good wife, and you'll become happy. Get a bad one, and you'll become a philosopher. -Socrates

Aerodynamic or not, a loaded box car is 90 tons. Empty is still 30 tons.

Granted I'm no engineering major; however, I'd love to know how strong of a "gust of wind" it takes to blow over 180,000 lbs.

A 1,000 sq ft house weighs about 60 tons. Do you think if sat up on a 5 foot platform a strong gust of wind could toss it off?
*edited to change bow to blow*
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reply to IllIlIlllIll
looks like the cars behind the camera got toppled over as i hear the engineer release the brakes before the car in the camera view starts to topple over
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reply to Smatchimo

reply to IllIlIlllIll
Let me respond to a couple of posts made in this thread.

One link I found states that a minimum wind speed of 125mph will derail a train which would rate as a EF2 tornado minimum. One train in China derailed from ~90mph winds. Hartley, Texas May 2004 a F0 tornado derailed 15 cars of a train.

Now, going off of CSX's website, their dimension of their largest boxcar is roughly ~67' 7" L x ~13' 0" H (100 ton rating). The best weight of an empty boxcar of this size I could find is around 31 tons.

Going with a 100mph wind and the dimensions of a 100 ton boxcar, the profile of the boxcar would encounter a wind load of around 12 tons. 125mph (EF2 tornado) winds would put a wind load of around 19 tons.

Not an engineer -train driver or otherwise- but I suspect 12 tons of wind pressure pushing on the entire side profile of an empty 31 ton car would being about some serious consequences considering the higher center of gravity and that the car is supported by 4 wheels that contact the rails at a theoretical point of tangency. And this is at minimum speeds found in straight-line winds or EF0-EF1 tornadoes.

Sure there are tons of variables that can be kicked around like type of car, the load it was carrying, etc but the point I am trying to make is that is probably doesn't take a lot to push over an empty car. Not knowing the location or date I can't find any information of what this train encountered. Straight line winds or tornado (and at what rating)?

Watching the video, at 1:00-1:03 it appears the trees on the right are toppling over on top of the train. I believe around 1:10 the car in view is pulled down by the cars behind it already being dragged along the side of the road grade. Wind load already in factor, it makes me wonder if the trees are actually falling over, and if so, what role that played into the derailment.

Just thinking out loud........bash away.

ADD: It's obvious the train derailed somewhere in the middle of the train. The cars that are blown over are being dragged by the cars in front of it but the cars behind it aren't as affected by the derailment in front of them since the kinetic energy just pushes any derailed cars partially in it's path out of the way. The cylindrical car wasn't affected by wind load nearly as much as the wind travels around the car more easily. It wasn't the weakest link in the derailment and simply pushed through the toppled cars. The point of derailment was highly localized and toppling winds affected only the area of the coal cars and/or the cars behind are loaded with freight thus more resistant to perpendicular wind load.

reply to IllIlIlllIll
All this over a simple and sweet video of a train falling down.
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reply to IllIlIlllIll
Just wondered why the engineer didn't slow down or stop if he saw a tornado up ahead, rather than just keep barreling into the area...

It can take on the order of miles to stop a loaded freight train. If it was a downburst and not a tornado, he wouldn't have seen it coming anyway.

Same thing happened in the 1974 Xenia Ohio F-5. Portion of a freight train was picked up off the tracks and deposited a short distance away on buildings. Engineer perished, if I recall.
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All hail JoePa