Ethics of the Derailing Switch.

Progress, Volume VI, Issue 4, 1 February 1911, Page 548

Ethics of the Derailing Switch.

A derailing switch, as our readers doubtless know, is a device for throwing a train off the track if its engineer disregards a danger signal. Naturally it is used only in places where the train would meet a far worse fate if it continued on the track, as when an open draw confronts it. Naturally, also, the derailing is made an innocuous as possible, often by leading the train into a nice, soft sandbank of gradually increasing depth. The editor of Bailway and Locomotive Engineering (New York. November) queries, however, whether the throwing of a train-load of passengers from he track is the only thing that will save them from disaster. He writes: — “A locomotive engineer with a derail open in front of him so that the train will infallibly leave the track is in the presence of a most powerful agent for compelling respect for the stop signal given. No one will deny that, and probably no one would, from a theoretical standpoint say that the object in view by those who put the derail in the track was not eminently right and proper. A stop before an open ' swing-bridge is imperative and the derail merely automatically and mechanicu v mierpuscs a severe penalty for the infraction of the rule. “ On the other hand, a derailed train in motion is a dangerous thing. Even if no lives be lost, the engine and rolling stock suffer, the roadway is damaged, and the line is more or less effectively blocked for

some time. In certain eases injury to persons may result or even loss of life may take place. Terror is aroused in the minds of every one on the train who is conscious of the derailment, and grave discomfort, if nothing worse, takes place. “It is a nice point in equity or general fair play, as we may say, whether or not travellers should be subjected to the discomfort and possible danger involved in the use of the derail. Innocent people may be frightened or hurt for the sin of a man they can not control. “For our own part we believe that the general average locomotive engineer is a careful man, anxious to do his duty faithfully, and that in nine eases out of ten he does not require the drastic penalty of derailment to make him comprehend the seriousness of a situation he may be called on to face. Hie derail is a good thing to catch a chance-taker, but we do not believe that the rank and file of locomotive engineers belong to this class of railroad men. We are all making progress, and the chance-taker is not finding the modern properly operated railway a good place to do business. “Something better can no doubt bo devised which will be equally effective. In these days of progress, as we have indicated, where sensible men are taking thought of their responsibilities as locomotive engineers and who want to do the right thing, and are trying to do the right thing to the best of their abilities, the situation needs revision. “A good, workable, reliable, and efficient stop signal will eventually be substituted for the derail. Such things have been invented and have been tried. On subway and elevated railroads, where snow and ice do not interfere with the operation of stop signals, they are in use. Efficient devices which set the brakes in emergency, and on electrically propelled trains cut off the power, are in daily use, and be it said to the honour of the men running those trains the stop mechanism is rarely called into action. The moral effect of the stop signal is as good as the derail, and the effect, when it does operate, is not nearly so dangerous. Our hopeful prophecy is that the growing feeling which we see pervading all ranks of railroad men — the desire to make American railroads the safest in the worldwill in time completely eliminate the chance-taker, and in time the derail will make way for the effective, efficient and harmless stop signal. ’ ’