The maximum speed of the monorail during normal operations is 40 mph (at least according to Wikipedia).
Others have placed the speed of this crash at just 15 mph.
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Monorail Accident
- Thread starter PatNSCT
- Start date
The maximum speed of the monorail during normal operations is 40 mph (at least according to Wikipedia).
Others have placed the speed of this crash at just 15 mph.
FreedomWrangler
Active Member
Might want to do a bit of good investigative police work and read the other 65 pages of thread for some details/background before handing out speeding tickets.
Just sayin'...I envy and enjoy good police work.
Slipknot
Well-Known Member
Spur lines do not allow the trains to go over 15mph.
SOLISIMO
Member
Im telling you right now based on my 10 years of experience that crash was not at 15 mph especially with a fatality
WDW Monorail
Well-Known Member
A car and a monorail are two totally different things. The inertia from a train moving at 15 is much, much greater than that of a car.
The train was moving no more than 15 mph, as allowed by the MAPO override.
Buried20KLeague
Well-Known Member
Everything you're asking about has been discussed MULTIPLE TIMES throughout this whole thread.
And fyi, you're talking about a 50 ton train plowing into a fiberglass cab. The damage you see wouldn't require 40+ miles per hour.
Slipknot
Well-Known Member
Then you must not know much about monorails... :shrug:
SOLISIMO
Member
If you two belive (by looking at those pictures) that this crash occured at 15mph then keep drinking the koolaid, and :the spur lines that wont allow the speeding train worked just like all the other safety measures did
Buried20KLeague
Well-Known Member
You might be a GREAT cop... But I'm going to go out on a limb and guess you weren't the best physics student. :lol:
I kid, I kid.
SOLISIMO
Member
ok then I must be wrong
Deadmanwalking
Member
As this is the only crash of a monorail that I have ever heard of I'm a little unsure as to how you come to that conclusion? Was it based on the amount of damage? If so you should remember that the monorail is a train that isn't designed to impact standards like an automobile. Looking at the pictures and knowing the amount of inertia that would be involved at only 15 mph I could easily see that much damage at that low speed.
Speed is only one part of the equation the other is the mass of the object. I would much rather be hit by photon traveling at the speed of light than a freight train at 5 mph... In fact I think while I was walking to lunch a few minutes ago I was subjected to millions of photon collisions.
erstwo
Well-Known Member
One Rail, One Family
Thank you for posting this.
To remind us that a "family" as well as two other families are mourning a huge loss this day and for many days to come.
My prayers now are with not only the family of the young man who lost his life, but also with those who were also working the monorail system that night.
This was a tragic accident.
SOLISIMO
Member
You might be a GREAT cop... But I'm going to go out on a limb and guess you weren't the best physics student. :lol:
I kid, I kid.
Now thats funny:ROFLOL:
Buried20KLeague
Well-Known Member
Okay, so I've read this whole thread off and on for the past couple days. Very interesting read, and I feel horrible for the family.
It's amazing to me the knowledge that we have among us on this site to get to the bottom of something like this using some pretty sophisticated logic.
My question is:
Do we think that purple (Austin) was completely handcuffed here because MAPO had him e-stopped (because pink was too close), and if that was the case, couldn't he have have hit override and thrown it into reverse even if he was e-stopped because of MAPO? Or if MAPO e-stops you, does it require a reboot to move?
I guess I want to think through what Austin's options were, basically. Everyone's talked about pink. But what could Austin have done? I've thought about it, and I'm guessing these were his only options:
1. Radio to get someone's attention.
2. Hit MAPO override without permission from Central
3. Open the door and jump
Can we think of anything else he could have possibly done? And I don't know if #3 is even possible, but I've wondered.
And do we know if any of these were tried?
Obviously it's bad enough that he was killed. But it's even more upsetting to me to think that he might have literally just sat there frozen or unable to do anything while pink was closing in. He HAD to know pink was on the wrong line for enough time to make SOME kind of move.
It's amazing to me the knowledge that we have among us on this site to get to the bottom of something like this using some pretty sophisticated logic.
My question is:
Do we think that purple (Austin) was completely handcuffed here because MAPO had him e-stopped (because pink was too close), and if that was the case, couldn't he have have hit override and thrown it into reverse even if he was e-stopped because of MAPO? Or if MAPO e-stops you, does it require a reboot to move?
I guess I want to think through what Austin's options were, basically. Everyone's talked about pink. But what could Austin have done? I've thought about it, and I'm guessing these were his only options:
1. Radio to get someone's attention.
2. Hit MAPO override without permission from Central
3. Open the door and jump
Can we think of anything else he could have possibly done? And I don't know if #3 is even possible, but I've wondered.
And do we know if any of these were tried?
Obviously it's bad enough that he was killed. But it's even more upsetting to me to think that he might have literally just sat there frozen or unable to do anything while pink was closing in. He HAD to know pink was on the wrong line for enough time to make SOME kind of move.
Rob562
Well-Known Member
Picture it this way:
Tie a Prius onto the front of a freight train. Have a second freight train hit the first Prius/train combo at 15MPH. What happens to the Prius?
-Rob
RiversideBunny
New Member
What color is the Prius?
:animwink:
:animwink:
wild01ride
Well-Known Member
Imagine duct-taping an empty water bottle to the front bumper of your car and creeping forward (without the gas pedal) against a rigid wall.
Of course, that's a little bit of an exaggeration, but it's very similar to the situation with the Monorail. The Monorail is contructed with a very lightweight, minimal aluminum structure with a fiberglass body (think of the decorative farings on a motorcycle or the fenders on a hotrod, etc.) - there are absolutely no crashworthiness provisions built into it because it is a system that is designed to be in a low to no risk service role.
Combine that with, as some have mentioned, a total weight of the electric motors, etc. (you know how much a car starter weighs, I imagine) which is in the tens of tons, and you have a very messy impact zone.
Heck, even most car bumpers will disintegrate at low speeds these days - there's a reason that the cosmetic bumpers are only rated at 5mph for IIHS testing.
Needless to say, there is a computer system limiting the maximum travel speed of the Monorail under these operating conditions (basically, for those two trains to be within proximity of one another on that track, they are electronically limited at 15mph and were only able to move within that close distance due to a manual override of the emergency stopping system).
Anyway, I want to take this opportunity to express my sympathy for the CM who lost his life as well as all of those who will live with these memories for the rest of their lives as witnesses to this sad event.
SOLISIMO
Member
Al Gore dies:shrug:
lazyboy97o
Well-Known Member
F=ma The body of a Mark VI is just fiberglass. Its not like it was ripping through structural steel.
wild01ride
Well-Known Member
LOL!
Probably a better explanation than my own (more "main-stream" LOL!).
LOL! x2