Good one! You know, there are ratings for slings and straps. Now you can see why it's important to have an inspection before a major lift. Looks like this loco was being unloaded from a ship. At least they didn't drop it into the drink! Call the insurance company...and the owner.

Reminds me of the time Seashore Trolley Museum acquired the building from an abandoned Boston Elevated station. The first attempt to lift the structure resulted in a span bar bending like a paper clip. As I recall, the group found another crane and rigging company with sturdier equipment to get the job done. (there, now we have a railway preservation angle)

Regarding the video: I wonder if the crew remembered to check the rigging for evidence of weak spots before hooking up to the locomotive. I just hope all workers were watching the process from a safe distance.

Time to fire up the Garratt!

Happened a year or two ago at Newport docks in the UK too, brand new class 70, went straight for spares recovery !

Mike

Forgot to attach the picture. This would be ideal for lightly laid lines

Mike Pannell

Aw crap!

Somebody said this was taken in Russia.

...cue Soviet Russia jokes.

Stay thirsty my friends ;)

The one from the video was in Russia. The photo is from one a couple years ago in the UK. Considering the relatively small number of locomotives that are unloaded from ships, this seems to be an all too common occurrence. Do they under-estimate the weight?

Hope they didn't decline the insurance on the shipment! ;)

I actually talked with someone who had to deal with a similar situation a while back. He said that they handle this pretty much the same way you'd expect a car insurance deal to go down--insurance pays off and owns it, and if you want anything from it you buy it off the insurance company or the breaker they sell it to. A great deal of that locomotive can survive such a crash, but a great deal won't, or at least will be suspect.

If this had happened in the States, they'd return the loco to the plant where it would be "harvested" for motors, prime mover, electricals, horn, doors, and any other part that would be reusable. Indeed, the GE loco depicted in the still photo, Freightliner 70012, was shipped back to GE in Erie for just that purpose: http://www.railpictures.net/photo/370004/ It apparently took them some months to argue the insurance settlement.

Given the distance from "home," however, I suspect this Russian one will end up being acquired by whatever insurance company covers it, who will then turn around and argue a price for parts harvesting by the intended recipient company if they choose to keep spares.

Aw what's the big deal, it's just a stinking diesel. If it were a steam locomotive I'd be in tears.

A YouTube comment posted earlier today said (for what it's worth) that the movie drop was in Gabon.

Close, but I feel they don't have the experience to deal with such loads/picks. Keep in mind that by picking something up and moving it it's no longer a static load but a dynamic. Not all the weight is evenly distributed on most objects either. I have seen some nasty (and expensive!) drops in my field. The best being an injection molding machine dropped and flipped onto it's side in McCormick Place during a trade show set up, rupturing it's hydralic lines and creating quite a mess in an adjacent booth.

Love the 'do not hump' sign, looks like its been 'humped' already in the English sense of the word.

Mike