Antelope by the dozens...

Longwalker said:
There was no visible attempt by that crew to even slow down. They just blew the horn and swore at the antelope and maintained speed. Antelope can keep up a cruising speed of 60KM/H for a long time, and can sprint at nearly 100 KM/H. Stopping a train certainly is slow and difficult, but it is completely reasonable to expect a train to slow down enough for antelope to be able to keep ahead of it. That tragedy could have been avoided if the engineer cared enough to make a small effort.
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No, it isnt. If the engineman stops the train without justification, his job is on the line. And yes, they can track them and time them down to minutes, seconds on some locos. I've worked in rail for 36 years now, antelope aren't going to worth delaying the train over in the company's view. - dan
 
Scamaniac said:
You missed the part where the train doesn’t need to stop.
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You missed the point that at 100km/h an object moves 28 metres per second. That means the operator of the train would have required to start slowing down at the minimum 1 minute before he reached the heard of antelope. Good luck with that....
 
According to the National Safety Council:
A lightweight passenger car traveling at 55 miles an hour can stop in about 200 feet in an emergency—under perfect conditions—that is, if tires and brakes are in good condition and the road is dry.
A commercial van or bus will need about 230 feet to stop.
A commercial truck/trailer can stop in about 300 feet—that's the length of a football field.
A light rail train requires about 600 feet to stop—the length of two football fields.
Compared to this, the average freight train we mentioned above traveling at 55 miles an hour may take the length of about 18 football fields to stop.

To be specific there is no way to know how long it could take to stop the train unless a weight is know amongst many other factors, 18 football fields could be the minimum needed maximum is unknown, unless calculated
 
Antelope are incredibly unique and have no other living relatives on earth.
They lacks dew claws, like a giraffe.
They have a gall bladder like goats and sheep, unlike deer.
Males shed their horns every year
Their hair is brittle and hollow unlike deer but similar to caribou. They have a unique ability to move their hair through a system of muscles. Used for warning and insulation.
They rarely jump fences.
Considering how unique and easily threatened they are it is unfortunate that their isn’t conservation groups dedicated towards them.
 
Buckmastr said:
Antelope are incredibly unique and have no other living relatives on earth.
They lacks dew claws, like a giraffe.
They have a gall bladder like goats and sheep, unlike deer.
Males shed their horns every year
Their hair is brittle and hollow unlike deer but similar to caribou. They have a unique ability to move their hair through a system of muscles. Used for warning and insulation.
They rarely jump fences.
Considering how unique and easily threatened they are it is unfortunate that their isn’t conservation groups dedicated towards them.
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There are. The antelope in Canada live at the northern extreme of their range and are very vulnerable, no way around that, but we are fortunate to have a huntable population.

Grizz
 
Having done my railway conductor training, I can say confidently that people just don't understand how long it takes to fully stop a train moving at that speed (it takes over a km and up to 2km sometimes depending on the amount of weight) . Furthermore, the train slowing down wouldn't really be felt in the video due to how long it takes. You also wouldn't hear the brakes from the front of the locomotive because they are all behind you and there's that huge diesel engine between you and all the brakes. Also, the diesel engine is not what is driving the wheels so there wouldn't be a very noticeable change in the rpm range of that engine like in a car. These locomotives are diesel electric, the wheels are being driven by big electric motors. the engine is just a big generator.

One more thing people don't realize, it's illegal to put a train in emergency braking unless it's absolutely required. Wildlife is not one of those reasons (neither is it for a car on the rails until you actually make contact). If the train was carrying dangerous goods (which most do), putting it into emergency braking could derail cars and cause a much bigger disaster. Some of the stuff trains carry is so dangerous that it's the only way to transport it (as in you can't transport by air, or road because of the greater risk).

Yes it sucks that this happened but it certainly isn't what they wanted if they could've done more I'm sure. We'll have to wait on the investigation and the review of the black boxes to see if they were trying to slow down or not. I'm pretty sure they were trying though. They were probably pretty heavy and in winter time it takes even longer to stop.
 
There is groups dedicated to antelope conservation and improvement projects. In fact there is a group in AB making good headway at getting landowners to allow removal of the bottom wire on pasture fencing to allow antelope to pass freely on their dedicated travel routes to preferred seasonal & breeding habitats since they don't jump fences like a deer will.
 
I talk to an old engineer that ran trains to tumbler ridge, he told me about the multiple-hundreds of moose that he had run over in northern B.C. especially when the snow banks trapped them on the tracks.
 
That's terrible!!! I doubt the engineer enjoyed doing that,,,,or at least I hope he didnt. Antelope rely on their speed to get out of trouble, they thought they could outrun the train. That, coupled with they don't jump off a path or obstacles = disaster.

Why the idiots filmed this and released it is beyond stupid...some things are better left alone then to post on social media.
 
That killed more antelope than I have seen in my life.


(Grew up the city, lived U.K. for 15 years, live in the city now, but still, to me that's a lot of wasted antelope.)
 
TheTooner said:
That killed more antelope than I have seen in my life.


(Grew up the city, lived U.K. for 15 years, live in the city now, but still, to me that's a lot of wasted antelope.)
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I seen hundreds here today, in the city limits, on my way to the store earlier. Growing up in S.E Alberta it wasn't uncommon to see herds of many hundreds all over the place. We had a bad winter kill about 15 years ago, but they have came back in not bad numbers since then.
 
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"We'll have to wait on the investigation and the review of the black boxes to see if they were trying to slow down or not"

Is this important enough to investigate? Haven't seen it on the news- was it reported?
 
Scamaniac said:
Experts? You’re the one using words like probably. Please enlighten us to to the speed of that freight train and the amount of speed reduction required to not wipe out that herd ? Antelope can run 60 mph and they were really moving. I didn’t hear any rpm change or braking. Only a horn and engineer calling them stupid.
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Antelope cannot run 60 mph on train tracks and trains are electrically driven so you won't here an rpm change as the engine itself just runs a generator. Main line trains do not run over 60 mph as its their limit. The train was easily going slower than that and a single four axle train engine weighs 350,000 lbs with how many cars ? It takes a mile pus to stop a "normal" train.
 
Ed Smurf said:
"We'll have to wait on the investigation and the review of the black boxes to see if they were trying to slow down or not"

Is this important enough to investigate? Haven't seen it on the news- was it reported?
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I don't personally think it's worth investigating but all the sjw's will want that and if it doesn't happen than cp will be labeled evil...
 
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