In less than five full days (including a work weekend) after the incident that damaged former N&W 4-8-0 475, Strasburg Rail Road's general manager Jim Hager is reporting that the locomotive is back in service today.

He also reports the FRA will be investigating the accident and inspecting the loco.

https://www.trains.com/trn/news-reviews ... -accident/

Photo of our beloved 475 as she returns to service early this morning. Many thanks you those of you that supported us the last couple of days.

Fantastic!

The "gold standard". Period.

Excellent!

Well Done!

I'd like to follow up on Ted's comments from today by echoing my appreciation for all of the support that we have received from the heritage and commercial railroad communities during the last few days. As you might imagine, they have been challenging.

#475 returned to service early this morning to power a chartered film train followed by our regular excursions. Fortunately, the damage to the hardware inside the smokebox was very slight, confined to some of the cinder netting and the framework that holds it in place. The greatest tragedy was the headlight that was demolished.

Immediately following the accident, we began to compile drawings and order materials for replacement parts. I was actually on the phone from the site of the accident issuing instructions to place orders and move manpower resources around to get the locomotive back on the road. The smokebox front has been replaced with a steel disc. All other parts were repaired and reused in some way. The smokebox door was brazed back together over about a 12 hour period where the pieces were all reassembled. This didn't go perfectly because of the amount of braze material needed and the small size and number of pieces. Due to some warping, we decided to remove the original clamping flange from the door and attach the entire piece to a new steel ring that the dogs clamp against. We had to replace one stanchion for the grab iron machined from steel and we replaced the door hinges attached to the smokebox cover to ensure the door fit properly and swings freely. A replacement headlight was dug out of our storage and was completely rewired and some missing parts for the focusing mechanism were fabricated. The last of the parts were installed and the locomotive had a new fire lit by 2:00 PM on Sunday; just over 96 hours after the damage occurred.

We certainly don't want to celebrate the errors that led to the damage, but I would be wrong to not acknowledge how dedicated our staff is and the amount of effort that was put in to get #475 back on the road. We truly have the greatest bunch of men and women working here at this railroad who pull together, bite their lips and do what needs to be done when things get difficult. I cannot thank them enough.

At some future time, I'll address what happened and what we have learned from it. At this time the only thing I will say is that two veteran employees, individuals who make invaluable contributions to our operation every day, made mistakes at the same place at almost the same time and it led to a very public accident. At SRC I lead our Confidential Close Call Reporting System Peer Review Team, where we analyze anonymous reports submitted by employees when things like this happen but they don't quite get to the point of impact. Let me say, they happen all the time and they happen at every railroad in the country, because railroads are run by humans and humans are fallible beings. My shop superintendent spent 27 years of his career with Union Pacific as a locomotive terminal and power distribution manager and he said that what happened to us happens every day on the UP. The point of the PRT is to determine the root cause of these near misses and how to prevent them. Leading this team and going through this process has taught me a few things that I will carry with me for the balance of my career. First, almost no accident or incident can be distilled down to a single cause. Contributing factors can number over a dozen in a single accident. Second, people who are inherently careless don't care about the threat of disciplinary action. They just don't care. In this case you have individuals who are going to beat themselves up more than we ever can for their mistakes and piling on the derision and punishment is not going to make it any less likely that the next guy is going to not make the same mistake. Of course, we will enact the penalties we have to according to the regulations and will cooperate 100% with the FRA, but we won't throw our people out when there is nothing to be gained and all the value they provide to be lost. We will look at our training, our practices, and anything else that made it more difficult than in needs to be for our employees to do their jobs and we will make changes to make things better.

Again, we want to thank everyone who has supported us through this and I want to personally, publicly thank the great staff we have here at SRC.

96 hours. You blokes are just completely and utterly amazing!

But, but, one of the commentators on YouTube said that #475 wouldn't be back before 2024, if at all. Are you saying that he may not have known what he was talking about?

Something that lots of people don't seem to understand these days is that just because you personally don't know how to do something, doesn't mean that it can't be done.

Having watched the headlight tumble onto the tracks in the original video, I'd wondered how bad that damage was...

Anything that was once made by man can be remade by man.

The only question is how long it will take and how much it will cost.

The quick return to service shows the result of having a experienced five-days-a-week shop, staff, and management. In many ways just like a commercial railroad in the days of steam!

It also shows the difference between museum time and real railroad time.

Two thumbs up to the staff at Strasburg!

Well said Mr. Ziegler and congratulations on the swift return to service of the 475.

Ross Rowland

Well said Mr. Ziegler and congratulations on the swift return to service of the 475.

Ross Rowland

Brendan,

Your explanation of how you are handling the incident as a whole is a refreshing departure from the old Class I management militaristic style that many of us have lived through and seen first-hand over the years. I have made some of these same remarks to just about everyone whom I have discussed this incident over the past few days. We are all humans, not perfectly programmed machines that never fail. We can and all will learn something from this, and in the end, life will go on. You are to be applauded for applying true humanity to this situation.

I knew you guys would pull this off and I don't think anyone here doubted SRR's abilities. Your team will continue to be the gold standard in this industry.

Sincerely,

Rob Gardner
ASR President and 2100 Project Manager

Nothing like a speedy repair...

Bravo, SRR.