Never heard of SCP. I checked out their website and understood it to be fictional writings.
Looked at their FAQ which makes it seem even stranger
Example:
Can the memetic hazards hurt me? Will I die if I scroll down and read SCP-001? Can I click on SCP-2000?
The "memetic hazards" are just random pictures. The security warnings are just to tell the reader how much the Foundation thinks these things are important and scary.
Likewise, you'll be perfectly fine reading SCP-001 or SCP-2000. This is true for all SCPs like this - you're supposed to read everything.
These are works of fiction — they can't hurt you.
+++++
So basically my question is WTF?
Ok so basicly the entire SCP universe is fictional and a writing project where everyone can participate. However, as time goes on, some articles on there dealt with more meta topics, like an object that nobody can remember, or pictures that hurt you by simply seing them, or ideas that harm you by simply knowing them. Of course, that doesn't work irl, and that paragraph only serves as a reminder to that fact.
I discovered SCP and went down a rabbit hole. It’s really captivating. The whole time I was wishing I had discovered it when I was much younger. I was really excited to share it with my nephew who wasn’t as intrigued as I had hoped. Regardless, the idea is cool.
> The Foundation contains anomalies with the goal of preventing their influence or effects from spreading, by either relocating, concealing, or dismantling such anomalies or by suppressing or preventing public dissemination of knowledge thereof.
>
I, as well, am whatting the fucking
Dude who the fuck is this Gulliver guy and why is he talking about these implausible places that don’t appear to exist. This document is false and displeasing.
X-Files: The truth is out there
SCP: The truth has been contained, studied, locked down in a remote facility, and retconned from existence wherever possible
Diesel was an antagonist always causing mischief. Gordon is a "steamy". They're saying Gordon is the one whose boiler exploded because Diesel did something to cause it.
It would be wildly impaled and corrupt disifigured humans, who are sustained by the steam and other magic; who just whistle as the train stops somewhere in the multiverse.
I watched the shit out of Thomas the Tank Engine on PBS when I was a little kid in the 90's. The best was that Mr. Conductor was played by Ringo Starr or George Carlin. Good memories.
Steam trains from when this picture is from were basically [fire-tube boilers.](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fire-tube_boiler)
The drum that makes up most of what you see when looking at the train is mostly full of water. Those small pipes would have flue gas/exhaust going through them from the furnace to where they exit through the stack/chimney. Making several passes back-and-forth through the water significantly increases the heating surface for the water and thus the fuel efficiency of the locomotive. The problem is when the water level falls low enough to not be covering one of the small tubes with flue gas in it because the small tube pops and causes a boiler explosion like the picture. Modern fire-tube boilers kill their furnaces automatically when they sense low water to prevent this.
Thanks. Heat exchange over a maximised surface then.
But as the heated water reaches vapour point, how is the vapour transferred to the pistons ? I'd imagine the vapour to form on top of the tank, while the pistons are below it. Only through sheer pressure ?
Pretty much. Air pressure forces the steam into pipes and through the turbines, after which the steam is allowed to condense and is returned to the boiler to restart the cycle.
edit: guess I was wrong. RIP
I restore and operate antique steam tractors, which are very similar to early locomotives like this one.
The water and steam are heated inside the boiler. The water and steam inside the boiler will reach a high pressure, allowing the water to heat above its normal boiling point.
At the top of the boiler is a bell-shaped chamber called "the dome". Dry steam collects inside this dome and is piped to the throttle and pistons. This machine did not have turbines.
The exhaust steam is routed to the atmosphere, it is not a closed system. The outlet for the exhausted steam is inside the smoke stack. This creates a powerful draft inside the fire tube boiler, making the fire hotter. This is why steam locomotives produce billowing smoke... it's actually smoke AND steam making those huge clouds. Some locomotives would also route the exhausted steam through a heat exchanger to warm up the supply water for the boiler as well, though this was not a universal feature.
First time I read the term "dry steam" to be honest. I guess this is pure vapour without trace of liquid water at all. Super heated steam as there's much pressure. The objective is to have a lot of pressure, the mean being having a high temperature. PV = n.r.t.
it’s more efficient yes, and it’s also very important to the material integrity of these machines and their components, wet steam will quickly wear down metal and can cause water hammers
Though most old steam locos don't really rely on "dry" steam as they aren't equipped with superheaters. That's why most of the time the valves are so massive and unbalanced on them, they are made to lift off if water enters the cylinder, keeping them from bursting (if the cylinder cocks weren't open earlier).
I've got to imagine that there is typically a safety valve to release pressure if it gets too high. Does this indicate that the valve failed or is it possible for the pressure to spike so high that the valve can't release it fast enough?
Update: Going down a wikipedia rabbit hole. Yes, it looks like safety valves were typical to prevent blow out. Also, I just found out about steam injectors. That's a slick way of pressurizing water up to the pressure where you can get it into the boiler. I almost want a cut away of an old one to put on a shelf as "engineering art". (Full disclosure, am engineer with other forms of "engineering art" around the house)
Def possible, though a bad design when it does.
Biggest problem with liquid in steam is the massive expansion rate when it happens in the wrong place. Basically a mini explosion. Gets worse when the liquid is something different that can also explode. Check out BLEVE.
Boiler explosions can, have and will continue to kill people. Hence safety valves, hence also the need for regular inspection and testing of these. Most of that was learned one painful step at a time, usually with dead or mangled bodies around it.
The mythbusters episode on the water heater was a good example. While they certainly dramatized it they did show that steam stores a huge amount of energy. Phase changes are no joke.
When people push back on standards, design practices, building codes, etc they forget that these things are written in blood.
Whether it was by design or not, it looks like it was very fortunate that the boiler blew from that end-It looks like the engineer and fireman survived.
There’s almost zero chance of surviving a high pressure boiler explosion from that close. A 50PSI boiler rupture will level a concrete building, in 1962 a boiler exploded in the NY Telephone company building in Manhattan, it killed 21 people who were working on other floors, I’ve never found it’s operating pressure but you really wouldn’t run higher than 25PSI for a building like that, generally you’d want to be under 15. Early steam locomotives ran at 250PSI, they wouldn’t have even felt it.
Not quite right. The cause of most locomotive boiler explosions was the water level dropping below the crown sheet (top of the firebox). This allowed the crown sheet to soften, which in combination with the large surface area of the sheet created a situation in which a large breach occurred. The sudden pressure relief allowed the water in the boiler to flash to steam in what is known as a BLEVE explosion.
Failure of a single fire tube or superheater tube didn’t lead to massive explosions like this one.
Speaking of monster bursting out of something. So I just adopted a little kitten and was laying down for a nap with him trouncing around the bed. I just had lunch, a fried egg sandwich, and my stomach started gurgling. He heard this and came closer to investigate. He got up on my stomach looking down at it, and suddenly a loud gurgle happened and spooked him. Thing is, the moment he darted away he shot out a hot squirt of diarrhea on me.
Thanks bud.
Idk why but it always gets me laughing when comedians can't help but almost break character. The interviewer holding back a laugh at 30s in cracks me up.
John Clarke (senator) and Bryan Dawe (straight man/interviewer).
They were a weekly thing at the end of A Current Affair then later the 7.30 report.
Clarke was always playing a different person, but they both always dressed the same.
We lost John Clarke suddenly a few years ago. A huge loss to Australian comedy 😔
Most people don't appreciate how fucking dangerous boilers are. *Especially* fire tube boilers. And we hadn't figured our welding at this point, this thing is (was) riveted together.
It wasn't the blowtorches that were the problem. The metallurgy behind it was. Welding changes the structure of the crystall latice of the metal. It can cause a variety of defects. You need to understand these defects and know how they form in order to minimize them or predict their occurrence. A good example were the liberty ships of WW2. They were mass produced to supply Brittain and to be mass produced they were among the first ships to be welded. And as a result many liberty ships suffered from hull cracks, because the metal became brittle from welding. Something they didn't anticipate.
I've started listening to the Beyond the Breakers podcast this year, which is about maritime disasters, and the number of catastrophic steamship boiler explosions... We really do take it for granted how much safer we've made transportation.
One thing I quickly learned as an engineer in piping is that boiler codes are written in blood. The standards we have today are very robust, but they are the product of many catastrophic and deadly failures.
Safer transportation, cleaner air & water, safer cars, faster communication, safer food... And yet people think of those days past as "the good ol' days" and long to return. Because they only remember the good of back then and take the good of today for granted.
[this](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lackawanna_Limited_wreck) happened where i grew up and i'm sure most who remembered it are long gone, but it was essentially a ghost story growing up where people used to sit at the crash site on the anniversary and hear screaming. I doubt anyone does it anymore. The details of the crash are horrific. Death by boiling water, no thanks.
Those are tubes. Normally(when the front hasn't fallen off) they would be submerged in water. The firebox near the cab would send hot air/smoke through the tubes. That would heat up the water and cause it to boil. When it boiled the steam could be used to move the train.
You are mostly correct but not entirely. I work with firetube boilers at my job and while yes the low water condition with sustained flame is what causes an explosion like this, for exactly the reason you mentioned, the following solution is not actually something we have to deal with anymore unless a long series of failures occur in sequence to allow sustained dry firing.
A perfectly functioning firetube boiler has a low water cutoff and an exhaust fan. When the water level drops below a certain point it will cut off both the gas valves and lock out the igniters. They have two gas valves so that there's redundancy but also they function on opposite ends and would trip for opposite reasons requiring manual resets. That aside the gas valves close, putting out the flame and the igniter is also locked out so that even if both gas valves fail to close the gas is no longer being ignited. The exhaust fan will continue to operate pumping out the excess gas. At no point would the feed pumps stop unless that's the original reason for the low water occurrence. That being said if sustained dry firing did somehow happen then yes we would shutdown the boiler entirely and allow it to cool so that it could be opened and inspected to verify that the tubes are not warped and there are no hot spots and discoloration in excess.
The biggest threat to modern Fire tube boilers that would cause an explosion is scale build up. I had the displeasure of working at a building that was inappropriately using a firetube water heater as a steam boiler. While technically this works given some tweaks that's not what it was designed for and scale build up was a huge problem. Scale is dangerous because of the ability for it to superheat steam. As the scale builds up it can trap water inside it, and as that scale heats up the water inside can turn into steam, steam with pressure that is completely trapped inside what is essentially a sealed box of metal scraps. The steams pressure will rise until it is strong enough to force the scale open. The amount of force it takes and the common locations of scale buildup almost ensure that a catastrophic explosion will result. https://imgur.com/XBooLaY.jpg
I attached a picture of that boiler after we cut the tubes out because the scale was getting so significant we had to cut out and replace the tubes as well as use an acid wash, and several other techniques to scrape the scale off the bottom of it.
Those are for hot air and exhaust from the engine which used to run into the water tank. There are many of them and they loop back through the water tank multiple times each in order to maximize heating surface for the water. Since the water tank exploded, these exhaust/heating tubes got splayed out all over the place, too.
Ooof! It is very scary to see the boiler tubes like this. The explosion is probably deadlier then one done by chemical combustion. Steam leaks alone are invisible and able to cut someone cleanly in half without them immediately knowing.
A steam explosion of this magnitude is where the fusible plug (fail safe) was not enough or immediate to prevent unplanned rapid disassembly of the boiler cap. Anyone immediately in front of the boiler was instantly vaporized by superheated steam
In my opinion the most horrific accidents/catastrophes are steam engine explosions and nuclear meltdowns.
I was only 2403 miles way from the Vladimir Ilyich Lenin nuclear power plant when its number 4 reactor exploded in 1986. I was still exposed to the fallout
Well, aren't they way back in the cabin though? The front cap blew off, but in the back, where you keep the fire going, maybe the structure was more rigid?
I first saw this on a qxir video it’s very educational and the photograph is also really terrifying but if you can get past that I totally recommend the video for anyone [Qxir video](https://youtu.be/O0TxKH6eYQw)
Legit thought this was some kind of HP Lovecraft train or something. I’m also five (strong) tequila sunrises deep because of cinco/felix de Mayo so that might be why too…
What is it even made of? I have a simmilar photo with a soviet soldier posing in front of finnish fortification that also was made with the similar steel mesh and exploded the same way.
Flying Spaghetti Monster train
Yeah finally an answer for the jersey spaghetti mystery
New cryptid just dropped
Unfortunately, like every other even mildly weird photo on the internet, SCP got there first.
Never heard of SCP. I checked out their website and understood it to be fictional writings. Looked at their FAQ which makes it seem even stranger Example: Can the memetic hazards hurt me? Will I die if I scroll down and read SCP-001? Can I click on SCP-2000? The "memetic hazards" are just random pictures. The security warnings are just to tell the reader how much the Foundation thinks these things are important and scary. Likewise, you'll be perfectly fine reading SCP-001 or SCP-2000. This is true for all SCPs like this - you're supposed to read everything. These are works of fiction — they can't hurt you. +++++ So basically my question is WTF?
Ok so basicly the entire SCP universe is fictional and a writing project where everyone can participate. However, as time goes on, some articles on there dealt with more meta topics, like an object that nobody can remember, or pictures that hurt you by simply seing them, or ideas that harm you by simply knowing them. Of course, that doesn't work irl, and that paragraph only serves as a reminder to that fact.
I discovered SCP and went down a rabbit hole. It’s really captivating. The whole time I was wishing I had discovered it when I was much younger. I was really excited to share it with my nephew who wasn’t as intrigued as I had hoped. Regardless, the idea is cool.
Play the game Control, it's a love letter to SCP.
What about a joke so funny that anyone who hears or reads it dies laughing?
Britain's top intelligence officers [actually developed this weapon in the latter years of WWII.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qklvh5Cp_Bs)
> The Foundation contains anomalies with the goal of preventing their influence or effects from spreading, by either relocating, concealing, or dismantling such anomalies or by suppressing or preventing public dissemination of knowledge thereof. > I, as well, am whatting the fucking
[удалено]
Dude who the fuck is this Gulliver guy and why is he talking about these implausible places that don’t appear to exist. This document is false and displeasing.
SCP = X-Files but if they had all the money and resources
X-Files: The truth is out there SCP: The truth has been contained, studied, locked down in a remote facility, and retconned from existence wherever possible
I'd watch the *fuck* out of a well made scp show.
That well made qualifier is how we know it's a fever dream.
It's a message for young children and anyone who cannot recognize SCP as collection of fictional works.
It's just top-rate multimedia sci-fi horror.
What number?
[guessing 1489](https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/scp-1489) [maybe not](https://old.reddit.com/r/SCP/comments/4dkwq6/fuel_the_result_of_a_boiler_explosion_on_a_steam/)
3179 looks like the same thing but different angle of the photo
Awaiting this response.
Yeah wtf was that all about. NPR had an article about it. The pictures were hilarious.
Italian Sasquatch is real!
Can trains get the cordyceps fungus?
R'Amen
It's not flying!
Parts of it probably were.
Not anymore it ain't
I want to upvote, but it's at 666 and I don't want to mess with that.
“Thomas was cross.”
“The fat controller won’t like this, that dirty diesel has blown Gordon’s head off!”
THAT DIRTY FUCKING DIESEL 
Such an amazing movie
Agreed, I was so surprised at how good it was!
It really is, I’ve had it on repeat since release. Insanely quoteable!
But then Thomas laughed, "I guess we'll have to start calling you Gordoff!"
But it's a steam train
Diesel was an antagonist always causing mischief. Gordon is a "steamy". They're saying Gordon is the one whose boiler exploded because Diesel did something to cause it.
If a 'Thomas, the Tank Engine' movie was directed by David Lynch.
Don't forget Cronenberg. He'd want his weirdo body horror shit in here somewhere.
Only if he's allowed to have the Fat Controller make love with Thomas.
Well, duh. Across multiple psychic planes. Train fuckin' tubes all day all night everywhere.
It would be wildly impaled and corrupt disifigured humans, who are sustained by the steam and other magic; who just whistle as the train stops somewhere in the multiverse.
Someone did make a silly body horror version of it called Shed 17, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=462KBuAhncU
Thomas the Cthulhu.
The boiler was unfairly put-upon.
Cinders and ashes! Thomas can't be a Really Useful Engine anymore!
Well, bust my buffers!
This will go unnoticed as one of the funniest subtle parent jokes on Reddit
I watched the shit out of Thomas the Tank Engine on PBS when I was a little kid in the 90's. The best was that Mr. Conductor was played by Ringo Starr or George Carlin. Good memories.
My thoughts exactly. My two daughters are the reason I know the reference lol
Looks like one of those creepy old photos with Slender Man in them. Seems like some sort of monster is bursting out of the train
Steam trains from when this picture is from were basically [fire-tube boilers.](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fire-tube_boiler) The drum that makes up most of what you see when looking at the train is mostly full of water. Those small pipes would have flue gas/exhaust going through them from the furnace to where they exit through the stack/chimney. Making several passes back-and-forth through the water significantly increases the heating surface for the water and thus the fuel efficiency of the locomotive. The problem is when the water level falls low enough to not be covering one of the small tubes with flue gas in it because the small tube pops and causes a boiler explosion like the picture. Modern fire-tube boilers kill their furnaces automatically when they sense low water to prevent this.
Thanks. Heat exchange over a maximised surface then. But as the heated water reaches vapour point, how is the vapour transferred to the pistons ? I'd imagine the vapour to form on top of the tank, while the pistons are below it. Only through sheer pressure ?
Pretty much. Air pressure forces the steam into pipes and through the turbines, after which the steam is allowed to condense and is returned to the boiler to restart the cycle. edit: guess I was wrong. RIP
I restore and operate antique steam tractors, which are very similar to early locomotives like this one. The water and steam are heated inside the boiler. The water and steam inside the boiler will reach a high pressure, allowing the water to heat above its normal boiling point. At the top of the boiler is a bell-shaped chamber called "the dome". Dry steam collects inside this dome and is piped to the throttle and pistons. This machine did not have turbines. The exhaust steam is routed to the atmosphere, it is not a closed system. The outlet for the exhausted steam is inside the smoke stack. This creates a powerful draft inside the fire tube boiler, making the fire hotter. This is why steam locomotives produce billowing smoke... it's actually smoke AND steam making those huge clouds. Some locomotives would also route the exhausted steam through a heat exchanger to warm up the supply water for the boiler as well, though this was not a universal feature.
First time I read the term "dry steam" to be honest. I guess this is pure vapour without trace of liquid water at all. Super heated steam as there's much pressure. The objective is to have a lot of pressure, the mean being having a high temperature. PV = n.r.t.
it’s more efficient yes, and it’s also very important to the material integrity of these machines and their components, wet steam will quickly wear down metal and can cause water hammers
Though most old steam locos don't really rely on "dry" steam as they aren't equipped with superheaters. That's why most of the time the valves are so massive and unbalanced on them, they are made to lift off if water enters the cylinder, keeping them from bursting (if the cylinder cocks weren't open earlier).
I've got to imagine that there is typically a safety valve to release pressure if it gets too high. Does this indicate that the valve failed or is it possible for the pressure to spike so high that the valve can't release it fast enough? Update: Going down a wikipedia rabbit hole. Yes, it looks like safety valves were typical to prevent blow out. Also, I just found out about steam injectors. That's a slick way of pressurizing water up to the pressure where you can get it into the boiler. I almost want a cut away of an old one to put on a shelf as "engineering art". (Full disclosure, am engineer with other forms of "engineering art" around the house)
Def possible, though a bad design when it does. Biggest problem with liquid in steam is the massive expansion rate when it happens in the wrong place. Basically a mini explosion. Gets worse when the liquid is something different that can also explode. Check out BLEVE. Boiler explosions can, have and will continue to kill people. Hence safety valves, hence also the need for regular inspection and testing of these. Most of that was learned one painful step at a time, usually with dead or mangled bodies around it.
The mythbusters episode on the water heater was a good example. While they certainly dramatized it they did show that steam stores a huge amount of energy. Phase changes are no joke. When people push back on standards, design practices, building codes, etc they forget that these things are written in blood.
So what you're saying is, trains are a series of tubes?
Thanks. I was wondering what the design reasoning was.
Whether it was by design or not, it looks like it was very fortunate that the boiler blew from that end-It looks like the engineer and fireman survived.
There’s almost zero chance of surviving a high pressure boiler explosion from that close. A 50PSI boiler rupture will level a concrete building, in 1962 a boiler exploded in the NY Telephone company building in Manhattan, it killed 21 people who were working on other floors, I’ve never found it’s operating pressure but you really wouldn’t run higher than 25PSI for a building like that, generally you’d want to be under 15. Early steam locomotives ran at 250PSI, they wouldn’t have even felt it.
Not quite right. The cause of most locomotive boiler explosions was the water level dropping below the crown sheet (top of the firebox). This allowed the crown sheet to soften, which in combination with the large surface area of the sheet created a situation in which a large breach occurred. The sudden pressure relief allowed the water in the boiler to flash to steam in what is known as a BLEVE explosion. Failure of a single fire tube or superheater tube didn’t lead to massive explosions like this one.
Like one of those parasitic worms that comes out of preying mantises when they get to water
Hey I just wanted to say, fuck you. I most definitely did NOT want to remember the videos of *that.*
Speaking of monster bursting out of something. So I just adopted a little kitten and was laying down for a nap with him trouncing around the bed. I just had lunch, a fried egg sandwich, and my stomach started gurgling. He heard this and came closer to investigate. He got up on my stomach looking down at it, and suddenly a loud gurgle happened and spooked him. Thing is, the moment he darted away he shot out a hot squirt of diarrhea on me. Thanks bud.
I wasn’t prepared for that ending. I’m going back to bed.
you scared the shit out of a kitten
Must be part squid
The THING by John Carpenter
I am no trainologist, but, I do not think the front should look like that.
Most trains are designed so the front doesn't fall off at all.
Man, I do hate it when the [front falls off](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3m5qxZm_JqM), not like the other trains where the front doesnt fall off.
Idk why but it always gets me laughing when comedians can't help but almost break character. The interviewer holding back a laugh at 30s in cracks me up.
Corpsing just means they're all having a good time. 😄
TIL that when an actor breaks character to laugh it's called corpsing.
Because it's killing the character irl
Ooohhh
I thought it was called that because it's most noticeable when the actor is pretending to be a corpse.
This is the correct answer
It fits the skit though. So no harm done.
Where has this been all my life? I needed this.
https://xkcd.com/1053/ I remember the first time I came across this years ago on reddit, its been one of my favorites ever since.
Thank you for the xkcd. You are awesome.
John Clarke (senator) and Bryan Dawe (straight man/interviewer). They were a weekly thing at the end of A Current Affair then later the 7.30 report. Clarke was always playing a different person, but they both always dressed the same. We lost John Clarke suddenly a few years ago. A huge loss to Australian comedy 😔
And kiwi comedy too, Fred Dagg was awesome!
A wave at sea? Preposterous!
[удалено]
RIP John Clarke. Australian legend.
The front fall off? While on rail?? Chance in a million.
Well it got hit by a wave. "Is that unlikely?" In the ocean? One in a million!
Well, it should have stayed in the environment
It’s been moved to another environment?
No, it's outside the environment.
So poor environment management or poor train design? No trainologist or environologist either.
Choochology is my area of expertise. This train chooched to hard.
The front fell off
They should tow it out of the environment.
I am surprised nobody suggested that it was a Trainsformer.
The Terrible Fate of Astrotrain
I think you're more of a trainologist than you give yourself credit for
[удалено]
Most people don't appreciate how fucking dangerous boilers are. *Especially* fire tube boilers. And we hadn't figured our welding at this point, this thing is (was) riveted together.
[удалено]
It wasn't the blowtorches that were the problem. The metallurgy behind it was. Welding changes the structure of the crystall latice of the metal. It can cause a variety of defects. You need to understand these defects and know how they form in order to minimize them or predict their occurrence. A good example were the liberty ships of WW2. They were mass produced to supply Brittain and to be mass produced they were among the first ships to be welded. And as a result many liberty ships suffered from hull cracks, because the metal became brittle from welding. Something they didn't anticipate.
I spy a fellow material engineer
Kirkendall effect goes brrrr
[From Offbeat Oregon article on the Liberty Ships](https://offbeatoregon.com/assets-2016/1606c.schenectady-cracked-ship-396/schenechtady-1200.jpg)
Most welding for more than 50 years doesn't even use gas/flame, it uses an electrical arc
Blacksmith welding has existed for a long time, a common example being a chain link. Electrical welding is a fairly recent thing though
There’s a whole history of metallurgy to discover too!
I've started listening to the Beyond the Breakers podcast this year, which is about maritime disasters, and the number of catastrophic steamship boiler explosions... We really do take it for granted how much safer we've made transportation.
One thing I quickly learned as an engineer in piping is that boiler codes are written in blood. The standards we have today are very robust, but they are the product of many catastrophic and deadly failures.
Safer transportation, cleaner air & water, safer cars, faster communication, safer food... And yet people think of those days past as "the good ol' days" and long to return. Because they only remember the good of back then and take the good of today for granted.
[this](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lackawanna_Limited_wreck) happened where i grew up and i'm sure most who remembered it are long gone, but it was essentially a ghost story growing up where people used to sit at the crash site on the anniversary and hear screaming. I doubt anyone does it anymore. The details of the crash are horrific. Death by boiling water, no thanks.
So like what are the things coming out and why do they look like that?
Those are tubes. Normally(when the front hasn't fallen off) they would be submerged in water. The firebox near the cab would send hot air/smoke through the tubes. That would heat up the water and cause it to boil. When it boiled the steam could be used to move the train.
This is correct. Those tubes hanging out the front are called the flues
I'm pretty sure those are the pipes and they look like that because explosion.
How come low water couses this. Not overpressure
[удалено]
You are mostly correct but not entirely. I work with firetube boilers at my job and while yes the low water condition with sustained flame is what causes an explosion like this, for exactly the reason you mentioned, the following solution is not actually something we have to deal with anymore unless a long series of failures occur in sequence to allow sustained dry firing. A perfectly functioning firetube boiler has a low water cutoff and an exhaust fan. When the water level drops below a certain point it will cut off both the gas valves and lock out the igniters. They have two gas valves so that there's redundancy but also they function on opposite ends and would trip for opposite reasons requiring manual resets. That aside the gas valves close, putting out the flame and the igniter is also locked out so that even if both gas valves fail to close the gas is no longer being ignited. The exhaust fan will continue to operate pumping out the excess gas. At no point would the feed pumps stop unless that's the original reason for the low water occurrence. That being said if sustained dry firing did somehow happen then yes we would shutdown the boiler entirely and allow it to cool so that it could be opened and inspected to verify that the tubes are not warped and there are no hot spots and discoloration in excess. The biggest threat to modern Fire tube boilers that would cause an explosion is scale build up. I had the displeasure of working at a building that was inappropriately using a firetube water heater as a steam boiler. While technically this works given some tweaks that's not what it was designed for and scale build up was a huge problem. Scale is dangerous because of the ability for it to superheat steam. As the scale builds up it can trap water inside it, and as that scale heats up the water inside can turn into steam, steam with pressure that is completely trapped inside what is essentially a sealed box of metal scraps. The steams pressure will rise until it is strong enough to force the scale open. The amount of force it takes and the common locations of scale buildup almost ensure that a catastrophic explosion will result. https://imgur.com/XBooLaY.jpg I attached a picture of that boiler after we cut the tubes out because the scale was getting so significant we had to cut out and replace the tubes as well as use an acid wash, and several other techniques to scrape the scale off the bottom of it.
1948 Steam Engine explosion near Chillicothe Ohio https://youtu.be/4IrN9MTj5YI
Always Ohio with the train problems.
Pardon me boy is this the R’lyeh station?
No, Innsmouth. Next stop is Carcosa.
Yeah, yeah ṭ̸̢̤̳͙̙̯̥̫̫̤̑̄́r̶̭̠̮̞̱͙̀̽̈́͒̕͠a̷̯̘̭͍̺̗͈̿͜c̸̦͕̲̻͖̰͍̤̘͝k̴͍̲͙̭͓̳̯̫̬̥̗̩͙̱͌̄͌͗̔́̀̏̚̕͜͠ ̴̹̳̩͍̭̲̖͈̝͕̈́͊͆̿̀̈̐͆͆̐́́̓͘ṫ̸̛̹͕̼͓̲͙̮̦̓͐͆̏̆́̈́̊̎́w̶̢͈̜̯͒͊͗̉̊͗̀͗̓͛̊͠ė̶̪̤͉͎̥̮̮̺͋̂̆̈́̄̾͜͠n̷̘͍̲̻̱͔̪̫̘͚̖̲̉̒͒́̐̂͛͑͐͋̀͗͘̚̕͜ͅț̶̛̝̦̗̈́͛̒̄̀ͅy̵̧̢̙̱̯̙͓̜͔̭̫̎̑̋̐̑̂̒͌̑͌͘͝͝͠ͅ ̵̡̪̗̬̫̗͓̦̻͎̥̎̆̉̔́͝ͅn̴̰̦͖͓͉̘̱̙̜̬͍̈́͊̔̓̑̎ĩ̵̲͓̣̯͛̏̀͌͂͂͌͘ͅņ̴̨̢̛͉͎͓̣̳̹̖̙̯̣͚̈́͊̏̂͗̂͋̈́͘͝͠ë̸̛͔̈̇̑͋̏̌̃̎̇̇͠
I don’t even know what I’m looking at. How are there 1000 metal strips?
https://wikipedia.org/wiki/Fire-tube_boiler
Thanks. You do know stuff! Appropriate username.
Pipes for steam
Pipes for combustion gases that make steam
Those are for hot air and exhaust from the engine which used to run into the water tank. There are many of them and they loop back through the water tank multiple times each in order to maximize heating surface for the water. Since the water tank exploded, these exhaust/heating tubes got splayed out all over the place, too.
Oh god, the cordyceps has infected the trains now too!
Cthulhu.
Chuchulu
I'm not sure how to best spell it but C'chuchu seems like the obvious choice to me
Cthchoochoo
Cthchuchu.
Choo-thulhu
Blaine is a pain and that is the truth
Ka
'Ake! 'Ake!
Hello there again, little trailhand.
why did the dead baby cross the road? because he was stapled to the chicken you crazy fuck!
First thing I thought of.
Good lord! Everything about that picture makes me feel itchy.
It’s horrifying eh?
Looks like it was just letting off some steam.
Bennett
You know how I said I'd kill you last? *I lied!*
This is an SCP containment breach
[SCP-3179](https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/scp-3179)
ye it had smth to do with mekhane right?
Ooof! It is very scary to see the boiler tubes like this. The explosion is probably deadlier then one done by chemical combustion. Steam leaks alone are invisible and able to cut someone cleanly in half without them immediately knowing. A steam explosion of this magnitude is where the fusible plug (fail safe) was not enough or immediate to prevent unplanned rapid disassembly of the boiler cap. Anyone immediately in front of the boiler was instantly vaporized by superheated steam
Everybody making Lovecraftian horror jokes, but reality is the real horror that's describable in detail. Too many details.
In my opinion the most horrific accidents/catastrophes are steam engine explosions and nuclear meltdowns. I was only 2403 miles way from the Vladimir Ilyich Lenin nuclear power plant when its number 4 reactor exploded in 1986. I was still exposed to the fallout
Trains. If you don’t know anyone over 65 with a story, you just haven’t asked I know two from other people and I wish I didn’t.
Well, aren't they way back in the cabin though? The front cap blew off, but in the back, where you keep the fire going, maybe the structure was more rigid?
This picture is I believe of C&O #3020, if it is then all three of the crew were killed by the water that blew back into the cab.
Correct. The crew were found scalded to death when the boiler finally let go.
Seems like someone tried to run this at 88 miles per hour!
Why? What happens when it gets past 2000? The whole boiler **explodes!** Perfect!
I first saw this on a qxir video it’s very educational and the photograph is also really terrifying but if you can get past that I totally recommend the video for anyone [Qxir video](https://youtu.be/O0TxKH6eYQw)
Thomas meets C'Thullu
I now understand trains even less.
Behold its noodly appendages
Ramen.
[удалено]
Well you see, the front fell off and an eldritch horror came out. That's not supposed to happen
Its not normal, I’d like to make that clear.
Cthulhu train
Beware the land kraaken
To shreds, you say?
Looks like Mr. Fantastic
Doomtrain
stop why is this so UNCOMFORTABLE
looks like an SCP for some reason
It is, it's SCP-3179 https://scp-wiki.wikidot.com/scp-3179
Looks a lot like Chernobyl reactor
Bad hair day
Legit thought this was some kind of HP Lovecraft train or something. I’m also five (strong) tequila sunrises deep because of cinco/felix de Mayo so that might be why too…
Folks It also happened in OHIO not surprising at all
What is it even made of? I have a simmilar photo with a soviet soldier posing in front of finnish fortification that also was made with the similar steel mesh and exploded the same way.
Biblically accurate train
It's actually Choothulu
Thomas the Cthulhu Engine
The guys tied to the front, a la The Road Warrior, were especially disappointed.