Cascade Tunnel Operations (HD)
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- Опубликовано: 29 мар 2018
- This video highlights daily operations at the East Portal of the 7.8 mile long Cascade Tunnel located in Byrne, WA, near the Stevens Pass Ski Area. This tunnel is the longest rail tunnel in the western US and is used by Amtrak and freight trains. This tunnel replaced the Old Cascade Tunnel after the Wellington Disaster of March 1st 1910 and has an interesting history.
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About the doors from wikipedia: as a train enters the west portal of the tunnel, a red-and-white-checkered door closes on the east portal and huge fans blow in cool air through a second portal to help the diesel engines. As long as the train is within the tunnel, the fans work with reduced power to avoid pressure problems. When the train is approximately halfway through the tunnel, the door opens in earnest.
Once the train has cleared the tunnel, the door closes again and the fans operate for 20 to 30 minutes with maximum power to clear the tunnel of exhaust before the next train passes through. In the opposite direction, the door opens when the train is within 0.6 miles (1 km).
In earnest?
@@steamfire The meaning of what he is saying is not lost by this autofill. So the only reason to point it out is to make you feel good!
Power usage must be immense from all that ventilating
@@MrJckDoo What does it mean in earnest? One time a landlord wanted an earnest deposit, I said forget about it.
New here
What is purpose of this portal?😮
been in the cascades tunnel many times on the empire builder. gives me a kind of weird feeling under so many feet of mountain.it's amazing how this tunnel was built with the technology at the time.
for sure !
As if the 1950s was the dark ages. What technology here do you find earth shattering? Don’t answer I don’t care.
Why didn’t they close the door and fans on for the Amtrak but did for the double stack intermodal?
Coz the Amtrak is'nt pulling 7-8000ton's of freight👍
Imagine walking in the tunnel and seeing it close behind you
*makes crying doge face*
Stand in the direction of where the fans are blowing from, open your jacket, hold it wide open, and jump. You’ll fly right out of the other end 😜
I've been told by an " old timer" that if you feel uncomfortable the best thing to do is lay down next to the tunnel wall and outside edge of the rails until the train passes. I have done this in my young and dumb days and it works well, my best advice if you have to go through a tunnel is to wait and follow a train ( do to train timetables ) as they are less likely to send back to back ( so to speak)
@Dodgeboi9378 imagine being on a train and that accidentally closes before you make it to the tunnel
I think it's designed to break if hit by a train
There was a part of me waiting for Wile E. Coyote to show up and paint that door to make it look like the tunnel was open.
Lol
BEEP BEEP
Genius😁
🦊⚫
Roger Sharp Just need an EMD E3 Passenger Engine
I took an Amtrak ride from Cleveland, Ohio to Edmunds, Washington, for only one reason, because ever since I learned about Cascade Tunnel I wanted to go through it. So I took that long trip just to go through the tunnel. Also I timed it how long it took us to go through the tunnel, it was 15 minutes and about 20 seconds at 30 mph. Added bonus of the trip was going through the 7.1 mile long Flathead Tunnel in Montana, that one took us a little over 8 minutes to go through at 50 mph.
I wonder how, if the fans are not running while the trains are in there but afterwards, how do Amtrak passengers not get gassed with the fumes? I doubt if the coaches are airtight. Also are the fans blowing air in or sucking it out?
Coming back on 8, the fans were on when we exited the tunnel. On 7 they come on after we went in. Amtrak trains being lighter the engines dont put out as much exhaust as freights do. Bottom line, this tunnel made the trip worth every penny I paid to take it
I live about five miles from the tunnel in Montana and we're pretty far from the Flathead! It was funny the gate closed and was blowing the exhaust along with the train as it was going the same way as the air was pushed!??
Kinda insane that the problem of fumes was already solved - there used to be overhead electic wires to power locomotives. But they chose to tear those out and replace them with this ventilation system, and run diesels through instead
🙄😠
Oh geez. They could have put a little wye on each end for the electric locomotive then put the main locomotive in neutral for the trip through the tunnel.
in the early days the electric locomotives worked well but when travel through the tunnel increased, the electric locomotives became a big bottleneck in the operation so they had to go away to improve speed. it would have been different if the entire rail line was electric, but only the run through the tunnel was.
@@marzsit9833 only in my wildest dreams the entire rail network is electrified
@@marzsit9833 how are eject Tox locos s bottle neck? I find this confusing
A friend of mine and I hopped a freight train in the town of Skykomish on the west side and hitched a ride to Wenatchee. We jumped on to an empty car about 25 cars behind the engines as there were quite a few others in the cars closest to the engines and we found out the hard way why they were so close to the engines. The fumes were so strong that we had to take our t-shirts off and soak them in water from a canteen and breathe through them. I think it took about 20 minutes or so to go through the tunnel but it seemed like much longer because we thought we would die before we got to the other end. I was very sick after we emerged from that tunnel. The second time I hopped the fright, a year later, I got aboard a car much closer to the engine. Oh, our t-shirts were brown where we were breathing through them! Oh, it was apple picking season and that's why we were going east to Wenatchee and this was in Sept. 1974.
You had to basically water board yourselves to keep alive. First house I ever bought was in Lake Stevens (I'm from NJ). We used to go to Lake Chelan, Chelan Falls Park, Orondo, Lake Wenatchee all the time (camping, hotels, rental house etc.) Got to see Roger Waters play at The Gorge. We would buy so many Ranier cherries & cherry juice at the road side stands that I would eat/drink all of it until I was ready to vomit. Also rented a cabin in Mazama one Thanksgiving.
@@jackshittle Yep sure did! lol Hey, I was there! I think that was in 2000 or 2001, or somewhere around then. I also went to the "Dark side of the Moon" concert in, I think, '75 or '76. First laser-light show I had seen. I know what you mean about the cherries. They're not one of my favorite foods anymore.
@@jackshittle no they didn’t. That’s the basic design of an adsorptive filter.
Won’t work today. There are no “others” and you have to ride near the end. Too close to the engine and you go to jail on federal charges like that one RUclips wannabe hobo
@@kishascape Since you weren't there, you don't know. During the fruit picking season, which the train went into the heart of apple country here in WA state, the authorities used to "look the other way" as long as you jumped the train OUTSIDE of the train yard, at the Seattle end and you had to jump off when the train when it slowed down to 10-15 miles per hour at the Wenatchee train yard end. If you were caught inside the train yards you were "fair game". The apple industry and WA state relied heavily on migrant workers to get there and pick the apples and pears. There, you learned something new today. Feel any smarter? I don't think this "tolerance policy" exists anymore. Has anyone out there hopped a freight through the tunnel in recent years?
When we’re working in that tunnel, we’ll have the dispatcher run the fan at 50% to keep the air flowing and blow out the diesel smoke, the air towards the center is stagnant and no air flow.
"Working in" I'm guessing MOW? I know on TY&E when we have the J's with the fuselages and we need to do under 13 MPH we need them to cut the fans off completely for westbounders so that we don't get smoked out. Would love to get another craft's perspective on this beast of a tunnel.
Yes MOW, it's down hill going west so 100% with the fans isn't needed and the flush time is shorter.
Do you work there?
Thank you for zooming in on most of the signs.
More good info.
Wow that looked like a close fit for the double stacks. Thanks for sharing this!
Hence the notches on the West Portal! just for that reason so Stacks could clear! it was either that or redo the whole portal face and we all know how cheap railroad's are when it comes to spending $$
If a mouse was laying on top of that stack--his butt is toast.
Yeah I hope there’s something to check for leaning before entering the tunnel, because I’ve seen some intermodals go buy with a shifted load in the container and the top leaning to the side, sometimes up to a foot.
The Wellington Disaster is a tragedy worthy of a movie. It was on the opposite side of the canyon. You can still see the remnants of the track for a number of miles hanging off the cliff.
yes I know I seen it !
Amazing how you can see the smoke clear in matter of seconds from the door closing from 7:50
I have been through that tunnel a few times and I go by the tunnel like 4 times a year !
Thank you for this. 👍👍👍👍👍👍 Been there myself and loved it. Found your video because I wanted to be reminded if my experience there. I'm going back sometime.
1:30 That was Amtrak 130 before it got repainted into phase 2 to replace Amtrak 66.
Great video. Thanks for posting this. Have a nice day.
Super cool vid - I've hiked a bit in the area but never seen the eastern portal personally. Your comment about trespassing got me curious and I pulled the property ownership info from the Chelan County Assessors map. It looks like if folks stay on the access road they should be fine, (basically north of the powerlines) but BNSF does own all the rest of the property south of the road continuing on both sides of hwy 2...
the eastern portal is right under highway 2, but if you're not looking for it, it can be easy to miss it... from highway 2 all you really see is the gantry crane framing which is painted white.
I mean as lock as you don’t stand right up on the building or somewhere stupid and stay off the tracks you’ll be fine. I never had that issue with BNSF. Now CSX on the other hand and sometimes UP I’ve see calling the bulls on people from various videos on here.
Its hard to miss if your driving west on hwy 2. Sad in fact if you have never seen it and frequent the area
So interesting - thanks for sharing
I hopped a freight train in the eighties and went through this tunnel. It was the first time in my life I was in complete total darkness.
Railway property is usually from 1 to 1.5 times the length of one locomotive from the nearest rail. So just stand way back about 70 to 100 feet from the rails themselves and usually, that means you are well off of railroad property. Sometimes they do own additional 'yard property' nearby, so that might be a problem too.
guess again! when the Great Northern and other western railroads were built the had ROW that was 5MI either side of the tracks! a lot of that was put in hands of sub companies in the case of Great Northern it was The Glacier Park Company, many areas GP Co still owns a good share of ROW
Although a lot of the world works that way, I find the concept of unfenced railway property really confusing. Or unfenced property for that matter
R&R right of way is '25 from rail centerline.
BNSF usually isn’t a jerk like that unlike CSX so just stay off the tracks, be sensible, and dont stand somewhere stupid. If you’re in a normal looking spot they just ignore you.
Holy crap, nice catch of 7795 with H3 on the front and H2 on the sides!!!
I was very intrigued with your introduction about how the ventilation system for the Cascade Tunnel came to be. But when I read the last part I was kinda disappointed. For guys like you and I who like engineering stuff it's sad that it's become so difficult to admire them. Guys like you who have the time and resources to go to these places and document them is great for guys like me who don't but get to admire them from afar as it where when you make your video available for public viewing. I understand that security is tight because we live in such paranoid times. But when security is too tight, it becomes difficult to document them. And that's too bad. I do understand why though. I would like to go there to admire the engineering but also to do some fishing! That looks like a good spot. Thanks for posting the this video.
reddog 458 really really well said, I agree with you, I too love seeing so much of the engineering side of things ☺️☺️☺️
Would there be any pictures of the fans and motors anywhere ????☺️☺️☺️
Norfolk RR got really bossy in our town. Try to bust people for being on train property. Even people who lives right at the tracks. The town fought back in ways that I had no idea they had the power to do. The town banned any train blocking an intersection for more than 3 minutes. They banned any train traffic after 11pm until 8 am. Of course Norfolk RR ignored the ordinances. The police caught one train stopped and handed them the tickets. Norfolk didn't show up for court. A warrant was issued for the top executive for failure to appear. He was arrested. That got their attention. They don't bother anyone anymore. This was about 25 years ago though.
Bryan Hensley it’s awesome when that happens. Texas actually has speed limits for trains in certain areas. Rarely enforced, but they could if they needed to lol.
@@Bryan-Hensley I had no idea it could get that ugly. Great story!
Interesting video! Nice trains and scenery! Good work! Thumbs Up
Greetings from Romania
Andrew
I am surprised at the small size of the fans in use there. The Link stations use much larger fans (and more volume).
Cool video 👍 nice work
I've drive past (over!) that so many times and didn't know that was the east end of the tunnel. Thanks!
Pretty interesting the challenges made by having the technology to build a nearly 8 mile long tunnel! Thanks for this.
Has anyone but me watched this all the way through? Is that the measure of a true train fan? 😜
I work on a steam tourist operation and things just take time working on the railroad, you just can't rush it, so I am used to waiting around for something to happen but being ready to move immediately!
A remarkable feat of railroad engineering
I’d like to have that fan system for my computer :3
It's strange what YT will send one's way, but ironically I found it interesting. Kept thinking of the old 30's cliff hangers when the door to the secret tunnel opens and closes.😃
Hi Chris, the best way to remove the diesel exhaust is to create a “positive pressure “ within the tunnel. The way to do that in this application is to turn of the fans at the clean end of the tunnel, a low the exhaust out of the other end. However, you can’t have both ends open to do this, because you will not develop enough pressure in the tunnel to evacuate all the exhaust. Big opening to suck in clean air, small discharge to exhaust, at a higher pressure.
that has to be the scariest tunnel i’ve ever seen
Ewee Entertainment check out Macdonald Tunnel and Connaught Tunnel in Rogers Pass, BC...
Meaghan Alford I was about to say the same, at least the MacDonald tunnel Is lit. The Connaught is just pitch black and a 1000 degrees hot
You gotta check out flat top tunnel.
@@TrainGuy33 the Cascade Tunnel does have lighting inside every so often for safety reasons.
Check out kicking horse pass just north of the 49 in BC here very nice bit of rail .
What's a wonderful operation
The major rail terminals in NYC are all fed by underground tunnels, and the trains that go in and out of them must be electrically powered. But at times, in the passenger area of Grand Central Terminal and Penn Station,l, I have smelled diesel exhaust - when I reported it to a railroad employee, he said that once in a while a train has to be pushed or pulled into the station by an auxiliary engine, which might be diesel. (And this is probably related to the main tunnel under the Hudson River, which is ridiculously in need of repair after nearly 100 years of operation.)
Now I want to go through the Cascade Tunnel!
Great Job Steve
Am i the only one that thinks that the sound of the fans running almost sounds like an air raid siren?
Edit: 73 likes!?
Nope.
Sounds like an SD40-2
Same basic principle, just without an amplifying horn
@@djcfrompt Wouldn't the tunnel it's self act as sort of a amplifying horn?
Noah S. Yeah is that funny how Evan the fans sound like a locomotive that's PURE railroding for yaa.
Just when you thought the fan couldn't make anymore noise.....it dose! Wouldn't want to be near either end when running.
At the 5:00 minute mark, door closes, fans ramp up. Is it exhausting or intaking area at that moment at that end of the tunnel? Great video. We went through this tunnel on our way via AmTrak from Chicago to Seattle a few years ago.
HeartlandTuber The fans blows the smoke out the other (west) end, the flush time is shorter after a westbound train versus after an eastbound train, it’s down hill westbound.
@@jasonbabila6006 I think the movement of the westbound train itself probably helps to push air out the west end of the tunnel.
Conversely, if they ran the fans full force against an eastbound train, it would probably slow the train down noticeably and cause the locomotive to work harder. That would create even more smoke than normal.
1:24 now that a very good catch on seeing a Bnsf unit pulling a amtrak train down to the tunnel
I love this video, and recently visited this spot. I wonder, though: Where is the smoke going?
very interesting
Greetings from England. I'm loving some of these American Railway videos all over RUclips. This door and ventilation system is an amazing piece of engineering and I have never seen anything like it. Is this type of system used anywhere else in the US?
There are three other long rail tunnels in North America with active ventilation systems: the 7.1 mile long Flathead Tunnel in Montana, the 6.2 mile long Moffat Tunnel in Colorado, and the 9.1 mile long Mount Macdonald Tunnel in British Columbia.
@@LukeBNSF Thank you Lucas.
The only thing similar to this in 🇬🇧 is a long canal tunnel that needs a door and extractor fan - most of the pleasure narrow-boats and the maintenance barges have a Diesel engine that has to be left running to sail the boat through the tunnel = the fan is turned on and the door closed before a boat can enter, at the fan-house end - the boat enters and the door closed behind it
Search for a channel called Post10. He's been to a fascinating tunnel where there's a set of fans at either end feeding a cavity in the roof of the tunnel which he walks (and cycles!) through.
@@samuelfellows6923 I live in the UK. Where exactly is this tunnel you talk about?
Thank you very much.😊
I like train.
Why was that BNSF locomotive pulling an entire Amtrak train at 1:23?
If you put a ladder in the river and film from there, your untouchable.
Diplomatic immunity
"you dont own the water bro!"
It was 90 degrees plus when I captured the video. There is a VERY brief period with my wife and a young couple that we did not know skinny dipping in the creek. I won’t tell you where, but it’s there. 😎
His untouchable?
I am your 100 th sub their you go !
That's unique to have a road right above the portal. I wonder if the sewer connects with the drainage.
And the Door shutting.
Nice video.
theres a treatment plant on top stevens pass near yodelin community.
Why dose the tunnle close after a train goes through it? What’s the facility next to it? I have so many questions
Good audio capture of the fans coming on. I would like to take my field recorder and a shotgun mic up there for some audio samples.
So when did they replace the vertical lift door with the horizontal sliding door shown here?
What I'd also like to see is what they get in those filters when they clean them, I suppose that big structure too the Left is where it's carted out and loaded on a railcar.
the gantry is used to service the blowers inside the building.
so where is the intake for the fans and the exhaust ports how big are the fans?
Very nice video and fun to watch. Have a nice day.
so does anyone have footage of the fans themselves and controls? or is this entire thing autonomous with remote operation
Nice video, going to get one of the other side?
All those road runner cartoons finally make sense!
What do they do in a derailment ??
In 1996, a freight train broke through the doors, which failed to fully open. Replacement doors moved from the Seattle area to the site within a few days.
New Zealand has a similar operation for the Otira Tunnel in the Southern Alps
The turbine sucks rather than blows.
Steve Larson, how loud is the sound of the turbines in person?
Loud.
VERY loud
Hmm ... What does it mean when no lights are lit?
Is this site manned?
What's the wind pressure inside the tunnel when it's ventilating? Is the door one solid metal plate or multiple? Why do you have to stand back from the gate 50 feet?
Pretty sure it's not that much pressure, it just ventilates the fumes
Does this system not suck detritus into the tunnel.? Can anyone recommend a good video of when the line was run with electrical traction please. Hi from GB & thanks for posting.
Pretty sure it's filtered
@@sheppardpat47 That would make sense I suppose, be a daily job to clean them ...
Is that fans that spool up when the door closes?
I'm not sure I believe the stuff in the introduction about diesel being able to pull freight trains through a tunnel more efficiently that electric (I'll given them steam though). There are literally dozens of rail tunnels in the world ranging down from the 57km (35 mile) Gotthard Base Tunnel, and they are, as far as I can tell without exception, operated by electric traction which vastly reduces the need for kludges like 800hp fans to clear out the fumes.
Surely the real reason for diesel traction isn't it's inherent superiority, but because of the (understandable) lack of long distance electrified lines in the USA. It's simply not viable to use electric traction as that would mean electrifying the whole line (or using electric/diesel hybrids just for a short section). Electrification was apparently used for a while, but for a relatively small part of the system it wasn't cost effective. Hence this is a bit of a kludge brought about be the fact that the US long distance railway system is dominated by diesel.
I don’t think that necessarily meant efficient in terms of the traction itself (electric almost certainly being superior, although it can depend on the system used) but more on the side of “operational efficiency” as you’ve described in your second paragraph.
What is the maximum length of trains in the EU?
I thought I saw a nice fat trout down in the stream where the little green bush is... 🤣🤣
Nice action Steve.
A tunnel that has a closing door? Never heard of that
@Steve Larson @SteveLarson - Looking for the owner. Pentrex Railroad Videos would like to use your footage. We do, of course, pay for footage. RUclips will not allow any contact information here, so please reply here and we will figure out how to get in touch.
Two questions. Do you think there are any cutthroat trout in the creek and what is the speed limit through the 7.8 mile long tunnel. Interesting video and quite an engineering feat. Thank you.
I'm a locomotive engineer and have made a few hundred trips through that tunnel in the last 5 years. The speed limit is 25mph through the tunnel and as far as cutthroat trout , it too far up the creek.
I would cross Stevens Pass going to Cle Elm Ranger Station. Also went to the ski area.
a question because the tunnel closes, that is, because there is a door that closes?
What’s the curtain for
Is the tunnel manned or completely automated?
I wonder why the 50ft warning when the door is closed.
EDIT : Looks like I got my answer; it's a safety precaution so that people don't get blasted with debris from the insanely powerful fans. Not forgetting the noise they make too.
High sound level.
Could also be debris flying out of cracks.
Maybe if the train comes from the other side and the door opening mechanism fails. Though i think you need more than 50ft then lol.
I reckon it's to avoid getting pelted by dust, smoke, and debris when the door is opening and the fans are on. You can get a pretty good feel for the amount of air coming out of the tunnel by looking at the trees from 9:00 to about 9:30 while the door is opening.
Wonder how they keep animals from getting in there before the door closes
1:26 why is there a BNSF locomotive hauling an Amtrak train? What happened to that P-42 behind the BNSF locomotive?
I've seen that happen from a few times, it's usually due to control system problems with the p42s. They work fine while trailing, though.
What is it called when a RUclips channel owner places some written info below the thumb nail and the places for us to write in?
What I am after is, the titles in the video were WAY TOO FAST to read. So I appreciate that something else was written where we could scroll down to it. And the info was sufficient to give me a basic appreciation of this tunnel and the video.
Why does this tunnel have a red & white chequered closing door 🚪?
Anyone know the kW of those fan motors?
Awesome. The least dusty place in the whole state!
Why do they leave one fan on while Eastbound trains are passing inside the tunnel?
an eastbound train will be displacing the air inside the tunnel like a piston, forcing it around the train and out the west end. one blower is needed to provide make-up air. but, when a train is moving westbound it will tend to create a vacuum behind it, so both blowers are needed to provide enough ventilation.
Not gonna lie, it’s cool to see a BNSF train lead an Amtrak train
Does that creek have a name?
We have a tunnel here in NZ that is very similar called the Otira tunnel. Its 5.3 miles long but it has a 1 in 33 gradient. Like the Cascade Tunnel, it was electrified once, but that was removed, a group of GE U26C locos were modified to run this tunnel and a door and fan system much like this one was fitted
I'm in NZ as well. When I saw the thumbnail for this vid, before I'd read the title I thought it was the Otira. Very similar system and operation.
Do not stand less than 50 feet when door is closed?Can anyone say why, is there great suction from the giant fan that mite suck a person into the tunnel..I also wonder how the door could seal off the tunnel with it going over top of the tracks as it closes.This is a very intersting tunnel with the big 800 horse electric fans wow.
Probably because it’s VERY loud that close to the door from the fan noise.
Those grain cars are very likely going to the Tacoma grain elevator with corn being the most likely cargo, or maybe soy beans. Local 23 I.L.W.U. west coast longshoremen will unload them.
If somebody stood there while that door was closing would they be squashed ? On the Queen Mary a steel bulk head water tight door was closing and young cabin boy tried to squeeze thru but he got crushed!
Wait so why does it do that can’t you get trapped?
I think they didn’t load the doors texture file...
The feeling of seeing Amtrack being towed by BNSF
It's too bad they cant make an observation deck like the one they have at the spiral tunnel in south east British Columbia
The freight train didn't appear to have a tail light.
SBU Turbine was working but the flasher was likely just bad order. The flasher is far less important to train safety than the actual SBU function. Which is of course tail end pressure and remote emergency application.
@@Liam40 Of course... because everyone knows that
Uh yeah FRED’s are optional to the remote braking criticality
FREDs are not illuminated in the sunlight to save power
Owner of this footage. We'd like to license this footage. Look under your discussion tab for our email.
Wouldn't the tunnel ventilate better without a door.....open at both ends for cross ventilation?
Is Steve Larson still alive?
Thanks, great vid, but I believe it is Berne, not Byrne, WA.
Why was a BNSF engine pulling the am track train
Why would a BNSF locomotive be pulling an AMTRAK train? Particularly since the train already had an AMTRAK engine?
Just wondering if that 3 light signal is controlled by the tunnel crew or by the BNSF dispatch control room
BNSF Dispatch in Ft Worth TX controls all train movments
@@irongoatrocky2343 thanks bro must be the tunnel control the 3 aspect signal
@@irongoatrocky2343 just curious as noboby in the comments mentioned the signal where its controlled from at the entrances to either end of the cascade tunnel
@@irongoatrocky2343 and more than likely all railway signals along its own tracks including the tunnel I'm in Ireland and we call it a railway