Where There's Smoke, There's.... A CN Engine

Sunday, July 27, 2008 04:27 PM

Photo of column of smoke , taken by Opinion250 reader who will get a cheque for submitting this shot.

Prince George, B.C. - When there’s a plume of smoke coming from the BCR Industrial site in Prince George, it brings back memories of May 26^th . That was the day the North Central Plywood plant went up in flames, and sent hot ash into the air which then sparked a fire at Interior Warehousing.

This afternoon there was a plume of smoke coming from the BCR site, but there was no fire.

According to Prince George Fire and Rescue services, CN had started up an engine they hadn’t run for a while. There was lots of smoke. The crew couldn’t get the engine to shut down, so they let it run until it ran out of fuel and the engine seized.

No one hurt.

No estimate on the damage to the engine.

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Posted on Sunday, July 27, 2008 04:27 PM in News by 250 News

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Comments

Posted by: HD on July 27 2008 4:50 PM

I'v done that with a car once.

Posted by: getajob on July 27 2008 5:43 PM

Question:

why did they not shut off or crimp the fuel lines? Let it run out of fuel? Seize a $100,000 engine?

That sure helped our air also......someone was not thinking this one through...

Posted by: zoopdingle on July 27 2008 6:05 PM

How does an engine seize when it runs out of fuel? I can't picture how the fuel would act as a lubricant?

Posted by: RUEZ on July 27 2008 7:31 PM

CN needs to hire some of the people that post on here. They seem to know more about railroads than anyone.

Posted by: atvs22 on July 27 2008 7:50 PM

People shouldn't jump the gun so much. The fuel was shut off.If you think working on one of those engines is that easy maybe you should show some of us how its done,and yes they do seize!!

Posted by: YamaDooPolCat on July 28 2008 7:38 AM

A diesel engine will eat itself. All that has to happen is a gasket failure in the pressure lube side of the engine oil that then lets lube oil spray into the intake. It's a run away until the oil pressure fails from lack of oil and the engine grinds to a halt from lack of oil.

The only other way to shut shutdown a diesel runaway is by blocking off the air intake. They install these types of shut offs on diesel engines that work in the oil patch where escaping natural gas will make it impossible to shut a diesel engine down. A runaway diesel beside a well blow out could result in a well fire, so safety first!

Posted by: metalman on July 28 2008 11:15 AM

You have to cut off the air, and hope there are no leaks such as what ydpc describes.
metalman.

Posted by: lostfaith on July 28 2008 11:19 AM

Somewhat correct polecat, however a runway
diesel engine if not shut down will over rev and self destruct well before it ever seizes.
This usually only ever happens with 2 cycle diesel engines.

Posted by: lostfaith on July 28 2008 11:21 AM

I don't believe this engine was a runaway.
Big difference between a runaway and one that won't shutdown.