Secret City Excursion Derailment
 

Many of you know of the derailment of the Secret City excusion train during one of their runs. The trailing engine derailed and fell onto its side which also pulled their bay window caboose off the tracks as well. Fortunately no one was in the cab nor the caboose when this happened. And, most of the 80 or so passengers didn't know anything had happened other than an unscheduled stop. They soon knew when train crew informed them of the oops.

I work at the East Tennessee Technology Park (aka K-25) where the Southern Appilachian Railroad Museum resides. I ventured out into the plant with my camera and snapped some photos of the roadrash/damage to the engine and caboose.

I then drove out to the wreck site and found two persons inspecting the tracks and marking areas for repairs. I asked if they had identifed the root cause of the derailment. They had not found any smoking gun. What was evident was that the engine began derailing just before a switch where a siding reconnects to the main. You could see damage to the safety rail at the frog. It appears that a wheel of one of the engines trucks rode up onto the safety rail that started the derailment. Just after rolling through the switch, the engine rolled over onto the shoulder of the paralleling highway. I mentioned the possibility of excessive heat that may have allowed the tracks to bend out of guage since there were no bent or broken rails, failed ties, or failed roadbed.

The photos sure show a bad bit of roadrash!