On Christmas Day, December 25, 1931, Southern Pacific 4402 had a boiler explosion at Richvale, California. It was a GS-1 class, 4-8-4, built by Baldwin and delivered in August of the previous year. The remains were taken to Sacramento and rebuilt in February of 1932 and ran out its life until it was scrapped in 1959. Here is a photo of its sister take when it was delivered to Sacramento in September of 1930.
Oops. Someone really messed up that day! Any ideas what the crew did? I'd suppose they did not make it home ever again?
As sad as it is to see steam engines fail in this way, it usually claims the crew's lives, and answers require a lot of detective work. I do like reading the accident scenario to learn what went wrong and the chain of events to the failure. There's a detailed write-up on the D&RGW 3703's boiler explosion in 1953 (?) on the Palmer Lake grade in LaMassena's book, Superpower Railroad of the Rockies. It detailed the crew error that ultimately led to the accident.
The photo was probably taken in Sacramento after the remains were towed there to be rebuilt. Interesting stuff on the tracks next to it. That may be the power truck with the engine for a McKeen car on the right.
The boiler probably blew aft, leaving the superheater tubes flopping. All the flues are gone with the boiler. These events are not survivable for the crews.
I was in the cab of steamer when the fusible plug/soft plug, (actual name?), in the crown sheet let go. We all had to check our drawers! It put out the fire (oil burner), but there was no damage and just some steam. The crown sheet was covered and nothing was wrong. The plug had simply outlived it's service life, thankfully. But I still cringe when thinking about it.
It's amazing to think how truely well designed a boiler is when you think about the temps and pressure involved. In the case of the D&RGW 3703, the fireman failed to fully open the injector upon departure and it cost the whole locomotive crew's lives. The engine was scrapped due to the accident. The report said the crown sheet was in excess of 3/4" solid steel and had warped/stretched to the point of being less than 1/8" thick before it failed.
