Cargo train locomotive derails in Colorado, spilling 100s of gallons of diesel
apnews.com
The locomotive of a cargo train derailed in northern Colorado early Wednesday, spilling hundreds of gallons of diesel, authorities said.
The Great Western Railway locomotive did not tip over when it went off the rails at a switch in the tracks just before 1 a.m. but a fuel tank was punctured, the Loveland Fire Rescue Authority said in a Facebook post. The spill was contained and did not get into any waterways, it said.
No one was injured in the derailment, which happened near a sugar factory in an area not far from some homes, Battalion Chief Kevin Hessler said. The other locomotive and three cars carrying sugar did not derail, he said.
Not to minimize this, but could have been much worse. 100's of gallons instead of 1000's. Train remained upright. Sounds like they got lucky.
We should not focus on gratitude that it wasn't worse. Everything could always be worse. The point is to make things better.
Spilled oil is objectively bad, and to be harshly criticized, every time.
To address this a bit further up, where more eyes can see it: yes, be pissed that this happened at all, but it's absolutely okay to be thankful it wasn't worse. To not be thankful it was hundreds and not thousands, tens of thousands, is psychotic. Don't let that keep you from your anger at these companies, though. The derailment still happened, fuel was still spilled, don't forget it.
The only thing worth saying here.
Not to minimize this, but [minimizes this].
Sometimes you've got to appreciate some good luck.
Got raped? You're lucky you didn't get raped twice you ungrateful bitch!
Spilt fuel and rape are vastly different things.
The same logic applies to any situation where we naturally want to prevent future incidents. We should not focus on gratitude that it wasn't worse. Everything could always be worse. The point is to make things better.
Spilled oil is objectively bad, and to be harshly criticized, every time.
Spilled fuel (not oil) is objectively bad, but a small spill is objectively less bad than a large spill.
To take your rape analogy, it's more like non-pentrative sexual assault vs full blown rape. Both are sexual assault, both are bad, but one is worse.
The big problem here is that the root cause of a small spill like this is the same as for the large spills: poor maintenance and lack of enforcement in the rail industry. The only reason this was a small spill is pure luck. Thus, this deserves equal criticism, but we can still be thankful for the luck.
There's no function or purpose to your false gratitude. Condemn the spill. Full stop.
Sure there is. If you get equally upset over every injustice, you lose sight of what's actually important. Not all situations are equally bad, and thus shouldn't be treated as if they are.
Spilling 100 gallons of fuel is BAD. Spilling 1000 gallons of fuel is WORSE. People should be thankful that it was 100, not 1000 because:
It makes people less miserable. Seriously, if you're upset over every small injustice equally, you're going to be just miserable. Find the silver lining.
It focuses on all-or-nothing solutions. If you say 100 gallons and 1000 gallons are just as bad, because it's still a spill, it means I, as a company, have no reason to incentivize disaster mitigation. Bad things will happen, it's important to put measures in place specifically to minimize them. To turn this disaster from a 1000 gallon disaster into a 100 gallon disaster.
Focusing on being grateful that the problem wasn't worse doesn't address the root cause of the issue. It's essentially copium.
Sure. People need some cope in their lives, that's not a bad thing. Mental health is precarious enough without catastrophizing everything, and instead seeing what's happening as it really is.
Focusing on making big problems into smaller problems, though, is a real thing. Why did this one only spill 100 gallons, what's different between this spill and the 1000+ gallon spills, and how can we get more of the former, instead of the latter?
If you cannot differentiate between a small catastrophe and a large one, you can't adequately examine them to figure out how to make more of the bigger catastrophes into smaller ones. It's not all or nothing. It's not any spill or no spill. Spills will happen, it happens here, it happens in other countries, and it'll keep happening as long as industry exists. Learn, so as to minimize future catastrophes.
Of note, though. I have not once attempted to absolve the company of their wrongs. They still fucked up. It could have been a much more massive fuck up, though, and I for one am happier that it's a (relatively speaking) small incident than I would be if we had another, say, East Palestine.
I'm grateful when there are no spills. I'm critical when there are spills. You're whitewashing to minimize the pushback. You're seeking to cause harm. Gratitude is the wrong response.
I'm grateful that the small electrical fire I had two years ago was able to be put out and didn't destroy my home.
I'm grateful that the pothole I hit last year only destroyed a wheel, and not my whole car. I'm even more grateful that it didn't launch me into traffic, probably killing me.
I wish these things hadn't happened at all. I'm not grateful that they occurred. I'm grateful that they weren't WORSE.
I've also learned and taken steps to mitigate further disasters of the se nature from possibly becoming these worst case scenarios. I keep the fire extinguisher closer. I slow down a bit more and keep more follow distance.
This is why people choose to be grateful that a small tragedy isn't a larger one. It lets us get some perspective, learn what is actually important about these situations, and take steps to make them less likely to occur in the future. I'm also a bit happier today, I'm able to say "it could be so much worse."
Nothing else in your statement matters, just this little grudging reference to the fact that oil spills must be deterred, which I had to drag out of you as you encourage gratitude for oil spills.
What a false dichotomy. You can be thankful things weren't worse, AND be pissed off it happened at all. Two things can exist at the same time it happens every day!
Right, but the OP of this thread is offering meaningless platitudes in the face of an actual problem.
They're offering a bit of hope to people, that it isn't as bad as other recent incidents. And that's true. OP also probably doesn't HAVE any meaningful solutions, they're probably about 40 steps removed from anything that could impact this. May as well let people know it's not another MASSIVE spill.
You're a goon and a shill.
And you're an ignoramus and buffoon, I can do that too. Got an actual rebuttal, or just wanna prove yourself as dense as you seem to be?
I'd rather have somebody pretend to perceive me as an "ignoramus and buffoon" than to make people feel grateful for an oil spill.
Who's pretending anything here? And who's grateful for a spill? Certainly not me, are these people here with us?
It's like you read one word, and make the rest of the argument up.
Relevent Last Week Tonight episode
You beat me too it! I was just going to link this since I just watched it.
tl;dw train regulations have been stripped back so much that government regulators inspect just 1% of train operations and have no idea where any trains are or what they're carrying, leaving following regulations up to the corporations. The largest corporation has placed "safety" as #4 in their list of priorities and runs their trains with just 2 overworked employees who regularly state they have no time to check that the train is running properly and warn that a derailment of a train carrying fuel will flatten a major american city some day soon if regulations aren't changed.
You know who owns the rails? Fucking Warren Buffet, like that cunt needs any more fucking wealth.
It sure is a good thing we didn’t give those train engineers enough vacation time and sick days! /s
Hundreds ain't great but the average train these days has 20000 tons of cargo behind it -- could have been a lot worse.
Derailments are pretty common, actually. Like dozens to hundreds a year depending on the size of the company. I suspect a few incidents last year have made the news extra sensitive.
Most derailments are basically just the train falling off the track, very slightly. This was a full on train crash.
From the article and video, this seems to be one of those times it slightly came off the track. There doesn't seem to have been collision and the train remained upright.
I dunno, it's kind of borderline imo. It certainly suffered some damage, rather than a low speed step off that simply needs a crane to put things back into place.
If you do something with your car and it suffers damage, it's hard not to call that a crash. You might be able to drive it afterwards while holding the steering wheel at an odd angle, but you've still suffered crash-level damage.
Sure, there's damage, but the train didn't crash into anything. If I drove into the shoulder of the road and ran over a piece of debris, I could easily damage my car, but I didn't crash the car.
There's not really anything subjective here, the train didn't crash into anything. It derailed and suffered damage.
See that's technically a crash. You collided with the curb. It might not be a crash into another vehicle or into something like a tree or a lamppost, but you're still crashing into something.
In this case, the train collided with the ground, after falling off the rails. A low speed derailment would have no damage - akin to spinning out in an open road or something - but if you hit something and cause damage that breaches some threshold.
Roads with shoulders don't typically have curbs.
Driving over the lane lines does not involve hitting a curb. As I said, in this hypothetical scenario I drove into the shoulder and debris damaged my car. I did not crash.
There's nothing subjective about this incident. The train derailed. The train remained upright. The train did not collide with an object. The train was damaged. Honestly, you're really doing some mental gymnastics to rationalize your decision to call it a collision. If you're just going to do whatever you need to do to convince yourself that it was a collision, nothing I'm going to say will change your mind.
In the US, maybe. Last derailment we had in Czechia was in 2010. Germany had it last year, but it's still less than once a year.
I don't buy that. Unless you define "derailments" as "giant catastrophe". Trains regularly slip off tracks, fall over, and occasionally catch fire, even in Europe.
https://www.statista.com/statistics/1128848/accidents-on-european-rail-networks-by-country/
I am curious about the amount of rail in those countries vs the US. I know Europe likes their passenger trains a ton more than the US, but the US loves freight trains, and that seems to be where most of the derailments happen.
If the United States has, like, 20x the freight rail/trains, it would make sense for them to have 20x more derailments, essentially adjusting for population of freight trains. Not to give a pass to the States, for sure, but knowing this number would be a bit more helpful.
According to wikipedia:
Czechia has 9,567 km.
USA has 220,044 km.
Wow thanks for the information. I think this pretty well illustrates the point. The states have 22 times the rail as Czechia, so we'd expect Czechia to have 1/22 the incidents the states have. Now we need the number of incidents in each country and we can make a proper comparison.
I don't expect you to provide that, though, you've been more than enough help for a villain of such infamy miss Bonny ;p
You're welcome.
Mainly because the corporations won’t invest in safety systems
Or hire enough people for these super-long trains
I assure you diesel fuel is great for the environment, it makes it go faster.
It's got what the environment craves!
I don't think that's true; diesel fuel isn't red.
https://www.jdpower.com/cars/shopping-guides/what-is-red-diesel-fuel
Some is.
You see, the environment without fuel will not be able to go anywhere. By adding fuel to the environment it is now able to leave at highway speeds.
Where’s BoBo? It is Colorado. Is she still blaming Buttigieg for the woes of American transportation?