TBT…

This one goes back a LONG time…

There is a strong possibility the gent in the white hat, left background is my maternal grandfather, James Clark.

I ran across this picture while doing some research. At least 26 people were killed and 40 injured, most of them railroad employees, and debris was thrown up to seven blocks away when the 4-6-0 steam locomotive blew up. I know grandpa had moved up from engineer to an inspector around 1910, and worked for multiple railroad organizations, including ATSF, SP, UP, and others. Sadly, I’ve not been able to find any identification of the people in the picture, but that is one hell of a mess. Thankfully, most of those that died never knew what hit them.

HERE is a the link to the write up of the disaster.

 

Comments

TBT… — 16 Comments

  1. Hey Old NFO;

    That is cool as heck, one of your kinfolk making it into a photo from history. Unlike now where photo’s are everywhere, back then photo’s were rare and expensive.

  2. What Bob said. Always fascinating to find evidence that a forebear may have been closely tied to a historic event.

  3. Bob/Rev- I wish I could verify it, but it’s definitely interesting…

    Dot- Maybe… LOL

  4. We tend to forget that steam is deadly. Boiler accidents killed lots and lots of people, and even today, boiler operators (heating buildings among other things) have to have special certifications and training.

    I remember seeing the aftermath when a steam-powered farm tractor blew its cool. There’s a very good reason for having safety chains and shielding on those things!

    • Back in the ’90s a guy managed to blow up his steam tractor at an exhibition in Ohio (if memory serves). The boiler was badly maintained, with the steel in one section way too thin. In addition, the water level was down, and while getting the tractor to the exhibition site, he managed to splash water onto a part that should have been completely covered. The splash flashed into steam, causing the explosion. Not sure how many were killed; the owner/operator/idiot was one of those killed.

      Several years back, I helped with the annual test and Father’s day run at Collier Museum north of Klamath Falls. Did it for a couple-three years until life got in the way. Fun, but it’s work that needs close attention.

  5. As one that began life as a BT and a fan of railroading, THIS is why you always have water covering the crown sheet. This is also why railroads had limits on the track grades since too little or too much water are not fun events.

  6. I have some more recent photos of that area, 3 actually. I read about that a few months back, and on one of my service runs, stopped and snapped some pics. The round “table” is still there.

    That was quite a bomb. And most folks near it were turned into components. Bad all the way around.

  7. Sad that so many neat things are just death waiting.

    Weird (to today’s folk) is that some death and disaster was expected.

    Sometimes, on steam locomotives, the error margin was a tad bit more narrow than it should have been, thus…

    Yet, like many dangerous things from the bygone past, we are attracted to them.

  8. There IS a strong family resemblance.
    If you squint just right.
    I wonder what happened to the guy that said, “They’re designed to go higher than that, give it more steam!”

  9. TXRed- Total railroad casualties to ‘various’ things was over 2 million men, it was NOT a safe evolution… Grandpa always said the smartest thing he ever did was to become an investigator.

    George- One ‘theory’ was that a valve was closed on purpose, sabotage… sigh

    STx- Neat! And yes, apparently it was truly ugly!

    Beans- Yes it was.

    Ed- Maybe.

  10. Awe-inspiring.
    We play with such forces and rarely think of the possible consequences.

  11. My father spent twelve years with the Denver & Rio Grande – track maintenance. Steam was being phased out but still used during the Korean conflict. The span from Denver to the Moffat Tunnel had numerous derailments including one ammunition train and another with a tanker car filled with raw wine. The tank was leaking so a decision was made to drain it in place. The locals filled every type of container.

    The only death I recall was a brakeman who stepped off the caboose while stopped on a high trestle at night.

  12. Glenn- Exactly…

    WSF- Ouch, that’s not the way to go! I hope the wine was at least decent… LOL

  13. We had a large steam boiler in one of the jobs I worked, doesn’t really matter where or when – we caught a defective pressure relief valve during a routine check and called in an expert to fix it. I asked him what could have happened if the boiler blew – explosion equivalent to about SIX sticks of dynamite. Kept that info to myself and those who needed to know (not many) as it would have scared the daylights out of the rest of the employees. STEAM conversions/explosions are NOT to be trifled with.