Right on, Tom. Spreading rumor and innuendo only hurts the industry. In a community as small as steam operation, reputation is everything. Our jobs are difficult enough without having to worry about some uninformed comment damaging our hard won credibility. Thank you for your efforts to keep the discussions here grounded on fact.

Also, kudos to everyone who has posted on this topic for keeping the discussion civil and above board. A low water situation is the hottest of the hot buttons in this community. It is commendible that the posters have asked for factual information in an effort to prevent this situation from occuring again, rather than devolving into a flame war.

I think it's time to start asking the hard questions. Do we have a problem in the industry? I believe so. What is it? Inexperience in a few steam operations. I admit this sounds inflammatory, but I do not mean it to be. There are probably only a handful of operators where this is an acute problem, and it is not my intent to single anyone out. I think this is a hard fact to face, but I believe its time we faced it. Why is this a concern? One incident can potentially impact the entire national movement. What can be done? That is the most important question, and I don't know the answer to it. I guess its time that we implement national standards for crew training. Police ourselves, or be policed. It may be too late. From what I hear, there's already talk of the FRA developing and implementing crew training standards. Why is this a problem? We have already dodged the bullet once with the Gettysburg incident. Compared to the national rail system, steam is insignificant. The FRA could have taken the easy road and simply said no more steam. To their credit, they did not. Instead, they formed a partnership with the steam community, and better steam locomotives were the result. After all that work, which they were under no obligation to perform, they are now faced with another incident. When does the cost benefit ratio cease to make sense? When is enough enough? When will the proverbial plug be pulled? I see additional FRA involvement as an indictment of the steam community. We have missed the big picture. What happens to one affects us all. For far too long, our groups have remained insular. Its time for pride swallowing. Its time for a more cohesive national movement. The Revolutionary War slogan rings true: Unite or Die! Its time for national crew training standards. In addition to rigorous classroom training, there should be a minium number of hours of hands on experience. And this number should be high. Steam locomotive operation cannot be mastered by simply reading a book. Who will administer this (providing an FRA mandate is not a forgone conclusion)? Perhaps TRAIN. Perhaps another national organization. Whatever the outcome, all should have a voice, and all should agree to abide by the decisions of that body. How will this program be implemented? How will it be enforced? These questions have no easy answer. However, I have confidence in the community. If we have the intelligence and determination to restore examples of one of the most cantankerous contraptions ever devised by the hand of man, we have the capability to ensure that these contraptions are operated in a safe, competent and professional manner. We don't have to start this knowing all the answers. We just have to start.

Here's to keeping 'em hot,
Christopher K. Zahrt

Tom makes an important point regarding the need for all of us to hold ourselves to a high level in what we post here lest it decline into a personality driven forum and self-destructs as the Chaski board did.
Seems to me that RyPN is a valuable tool for our industry and properly used can greatly benefit the industry in many domains. It's up to us to keep it at that level!
IMHO-Ross Rowland

[quote="giterdun"]
Who will administer this? How will this program be implemented? How will it be enforced?

Don't forget that such a progrem must also have a mechanism for suspending or revoking an individuals license if there is a serious incident.

While my experience is very limited I have known licensed people operating boilers that were unqualified (narrow gauge, nonmainline, state boiler license). The worst part was they wouldn't admit that they didn't know what they were doing. Until I did it, they would't believe that pouring water on an injector to cool it would make it draw. Of course the check valves were not leaking. Yeah Right! And don't add too much water, A quarter glass is good enough, more will cool the boiler and we won't be able to give train rides. Yeah Right again, Can't give rides with a blown fuseble plug.

And old engineer once said the three most important things to remember in boiler operation are

Waterglass!
Waterglass!
and Waterglass!

The better question is how have other organizations accomplished this? If you search google or a library catalog for professionalization you will find a large literature on how other industries have accomplished this.


Tom Cornillie

My question is how do you set a national standard for such a diverse group of operators? How does an operation that runs their engine once a month like the folks in Bonsal, NC ever accumulate enough operating hours to meet the same standards as an operation like Strasburg? About the only things they have in comon are a steam locomotive and roughly the same number of miles of track. The same goes for the mainline steam operators who only run a few days a year and have virtually no track of their own. These groups can certainly get all the classroom training in the world but precious little operating time.

From an individual standpoint perhaps my situation will add to the discussion. I first qualified to run steam nearly 30 years ago. I had not had a lot of training but apparantly had potential and was thought mature enough at 19 to run a steam locomotive responsibly. This made me try very hard not to give my benefactors any reason to doubt their decision. For me at least this was a definate incentive.

Four years ago eldercare forced me to give up my steam engineer's license. I could not go take the rules test and do the mandatory ride along. Reading the qualifying rules of the organization the only way I can get back to being a steam engineer is to retrain as a brakeman, conductor, diesel engineer, steam fireman, and then steam engineer. This is in spite of the fact I am still a qualified diesel engineer on a freight railroad and have much more experience than nearly all of the people who would be training me. The real kicker is that all of this retraining will take a minimum of 2000 hours in their train service. Even after the eldercare situation resolves itself someday my job and other factors will limit my hours in their train service to no more than 100 per year. It is easy to do the math and see I will be retired before I ever operate a steam locomotive again for their organization.

Fortunately for both me and the organization I am far more interested in working on steam in the shop than on the road. I won't even try to reenter train service. When they are running their engine in the summer I will find someone else's shop in which to work on steam. It is no big loss to me. But if running the engine were my only real interest does anyone think I would ever hang around over the next two decades doing things I really did not want to and being trained by people who know far less than I just to hopefully someday run the engine? I can not speak for others but I would certainly be gone forever.

Working in what I see as an overregulated shotrline railroad industry I am not really in favor of a national training standard. We have far more rules and regulations on the A&R now than when I got here 15 years ago. I can not really say we are any safer now than before because the number and severity of the few accidents that do happen are really no more or less than they were 15 years ago. The thing that has been lost is some of the production we had 15 years ago because certain things are now considered unsafe because an accident took place on some other railroad, usually a class 1.

I do not think all operations should be subject to all the same rules. Size certainly makes a difference. National standards from the FRA or anyone else may put some of the smaller or less frequent operations out of bussiness even though they are safe operators. I really do not think our government should be regulating safe small operations out of busssiness regardless if they are railroads or not. In my opinion that is what more regulations tends to do while having little effect on the overall safety of the industry as a whole.

Waving at pretty girls and awestruck kids has been a perk of operating steam locomotives since the first one was invented. But when you are finished looking at her legs or whatever you had better get you eyes back on the water glass and steam gauge. Watching the smoke shoot out of the stack is also a part of operating a steam locomotive. I call it checking my fire. I think what we need more than additional regulations is a way to get more people more experience in the cab. We also need more professionalism on the job. Somehow we need to teach crews that not only are their lives in mortal danger but there is a trainload of people depending or them as well. For me that is a sobering thought.

I do not pretend to be smart enough to know how to do all this. It could involve things like using the steam engine as a training tool and somehow working the expense into the operation. Perhaps operations close to each other can share their locomotives and experience. Operators of big steam that seldom goes anywhere could possibly uses their engines as rolling classrooms on their limited shop trackage. I agree we need to be less isolated and share our knowlege more. I would also like to hear more about the 745 situation from the LASTA organization so we can start working on some solutions to the problem.

John Bohon

There was an incident several years ago with a deadhead steam movement in which a volunteer crew, with the operating railroad's pilot aboard, ran through a stop signal. In the ensuing "trial by internet forum" (which was not on RYPN---) it was stated several times that rules examiners, road foreman, instructors, etc. pointed out that "The Stop Signal is your God".

This should be the case for boiler operation. The Water Glass is your God. I made it a point to show my oldest son, as a child, what a water glass looks like, on visits to the Franklin Institute, RMPA, and Strasburg. I told him that if he was ever on a hot engine and he didn't clearly see water, say something and get off. The water glass should be the first thing that anyone with ANY steam knowledge looks at. Worry about the fire later.

(Of course, when I took my youngest on the Liberty ship two summers ago, I had to ask where the glass was. I'm not used to thirty foot tall boilers-)

I realize I'm preaching to the choir here about water glasses, but felt that the analogy to running a stop signal was important. The bottom line is, both can kill you.

One of the tests my teacher on the Strasburg regularly gave me in my training period was to ask me what the water level was, typically when I was out of sight of the glass. The rule was, even if I was returning from a trip to the bathroom, I should be able to accurately state the water level.

However, this is still a learned skill, just like we learn to always have a sense of what vehicles are adjacent to us on the highway. It requires practice, vigilance, and a gut feeling for the rate of water consumption so that one can estimate the current water level based on the last view of the gauge.

A hobbyist crew is simply not going to develop this skill with 20-40 hours of cab time a year. The rules and operating methods (number of crew, permissable reasons to leave the cab, memory tricks to remember procedures, etc.) for this operating scenario have to be different than a high intensity operation. I believe modern technology has a role to play to "dumb down" the safety burden. Just as the Frisco 1522 crew used electronic sensors to monitor their bearing temperatures, I argue it is time to monitor critical safety elements such as water level and crownsheet temperature with sensors. The alternative, requiring very high hours of service for licensure, would limit participation to a small group of semi-professional crew, and would eliminate the motivating reward for restoration volunteers.

Let us look at training and qualifications used in other developed countries that only operate steam locomotives in preservation as we do, and see if there are any good models for us already proven in real life. We don't need to fear what has been shown to work elsewhere and to not present onerous problems in implementation. At the very least, it would give us common ground for discussion.

dave

softwerkslex hit it exactly. If this develops into an issue with the FRA there likely will end up being an electronic monitoring system and a backup automatic water feed system on every steam locomotive left operating in the US, and it might be a very good thing to have anyway.

MX (not my real name)

Amen to that statement.RYPN is the best place on the web for this kind of information and debate. Let's not destroy it with garbage.

Several good points raised in this thread. First, Mr. Bohon raises a good point about additional red tape. True, adding bureacracy never increases efficiency. However, I think we're past the point of deciding whether or not we want a national standard. There is talk within the industry of the FRA mandating crew training standards. Whether or not it will amount to anything, I don't know. The simple fact that its being discussed is enough. Police ourselves, or be policed.

Mr. Herrod makes the point that its very difficult for operations that don't run on a regular basis to accrue operating experience. I agree. That's where we need to increase national cooperation. I think what would answer would be to establish regional "steam schools" at railroads that operate on a regular basis. Organizations could send a member to the school for high intensity training, after which that member would be qualified to train others in his organization. I believe the steam traction community established something like this in the wake of the Medina incident.

Dave raises the excellent point that we don't need to reinvent the wheel here. What are other preservation movements doing in the way of standards of qualification? The steam traction community is one place we can look. How about the historic aviation community? THERE'S a place that needs competent operators. How about England? They have a strong and cohesive national steam railroading movement. I'm sure they've faced the same problem.

We have a problem with crew qualification. Just look at the "horror stories" in this thread. The solution is more rigorous training. We need to stop looking for ways that it won't work, and start looking for ways that it can. National standards will provide many benefits to the community. Primarily, we don't have to worry as much about when the next big bang is going to occur. Also, it would provide an objective way of gauging crew experience, taking the politics out of crew rostering. Instead of telling someone "I don't think you're ready yet," which is subjective and can bruise egos, they can be told, "You have not yet fulfilled the mandatory training requirements," which is objective and not subject to debate.

Stay Safe,
Chris Zahrt

Very well stated Chris! Why is this a problem now? Simple, back in the begining(call it mid 60's) and up to maybe the early 80's there were people within these organizations that had worked for the railroads back the steam era. Then the second generation came about which consisted of those who were trained by the old timers.....now, sadly, there are very few of the second generation folks still involved outside of some of the competent contractors around the country. Sandberg(spelling? and as an example) is of a rare third generation that consists of those who were fortunate enough to gain mass amounts of knowledge both of mechanics and operations from well versed second generation folks. And today among the third generation folks there is a separatist mind set that leaves a vast majority of folks out there in the industry today entirely to unwilling to listen because they have a steam powered ego boosting device and feel they are above having to listen to anyone.
I can sum up the problem of late in a nut shell, when ever there is a quote from a newspaper talking talking about boys playing with toys every one gets pissy, and yet until such time that we do have a national standard for crew qualification that is all we are.
Solution? Simple, use vintage crew training texts administered by folks such as Gary Bensman, Scott Lindsay, Dennis Dougherty(sp?), Dave Conrad, Doyle, Sandberg, etc. at the organizations expense. They SHOULD be brought in to either simply qualify a crew trainer for the group or to start from the ground and work up.....depending on the knowleged level available. And, in order to get the number of operating hours necessary it would only make sense to send people(once again at the groups expense) to work with an operation fora month or so that runs steam everyday.
The idea of adding electronic devices to a locomotive to enable people that are incapable of doing what has been done for 150 years is quite simply horse droppings. That is a means to an end........devices get added and problems still occur(and they would eventually)so what is the next step from a public safety standpoint? Ending steam operation because of the risk of having improperly trained or experienced crews.

There is one simple solution, but it can only occur if ALL OF US admit there is a problem. Me...I have been predicting this event for about the last 4 years because I GET IT. Anyone that thinks this is just a fluke DOES NOT.......and there is the problem.

This moderator has been following this thread very closely, and I commend one and all for the civility with which this important issue has been discussed with a variety of points and counterpoints being made.

I just edited out a four letter word, but substituted two words which in no way change the message, but keep it G rated for any youngsters who may be following this important thread.

I've read several times the phrase "electronic devices" to monitor low water, but think there is an easier solution. There were low water alarms made by Barco and I'm sure others that didn't rely on electricity. Is it time to start installing these on locomotives? Maybe phased in over the next X years, like ditch lights?

I feel it would be better to rely on something purely mechanical because your source of electrical power is most likely to be the headlight generator, which is not always on. Likewise, a battery powered electronic unit could suffer from dead batteries.

I'm not suggesting in any way, shape or form that alarms replace crew training and competence, but these alarms would provide an additional level of safety. I have not fired an engine for over twenty five years (when I walked away from a tourist operation that needed walking away from), but I do know that I was trained correctly. And some of this training was from guys that learned from old timers (on the NKP and DL&W) in the 1960s, to back up Jason's thoughts

The Barco low water alarm was usually used to sound an alert whistle but it could be used to operate a boiler fill device as you suggested.

MX