CHAOS Report #3 - Beware of Copper Thieves at Work - March 21, 2007

Mechanical Liaison Officer's report by: Paul L. DeVerter II

Submitted by: Bob McCown.

Here is the third CHAOS report highlights some relatively recent problems with copper thieves.

The price of scrap copper has skyrocketed. Whenever this happens, copper thieves become rampant and passenger cars are a prime target for them. There are several passenger cars, of various owners, parked near mine. My cars were hit by copper thieves several months ago, when they were parked in a location with no wayside power. In that instance they sawed off several lengths of heavy-duty ‘SO’ type hard service electrical cord I had used for temporary wiring, causing me to spend most of two days rewiring the circuits (now in conduit) to restore electrical service on the car. I also relocated my cars to where I have 24/7 480 service (which I installed) so that there are always lights on and radios going, indicating the cars are in use and not derelict. In the past several weeks, however, the thieves struck another car parked in this area.

They are apparently using a battery sawzall type saw, which very quickly cuts even heavy cable and pipe. From under that car (a former Santa Fe / Amtrak Pullman-built coach) they took not only 4/0 exane HEP cable, but discovered the copper brake piping up inside the flanges of the center sill. When we coupled a locomotive to the car to switch it, only the loud blow indicated the problem. The thieves cut and removed over 40 feet of the main brake pipe as well as the ex-signal now-MR line and the smaller pipe feeding one truck. It probably took the thieves less than 30 minutes to cut the cable and pipe into pickup-truck sized lengths and depart with it. They probably netted on the order of $75 for the copper. Of course this almost totally disables the car, since it is not legal to begin a trip with disabled brakes from a location where they might be fixed, even if a run-around hose is available to bypass the car. The only possible alternative to move the car is a waiver and tying it to idler cars with working brakes. Is is unfortunately necessary to be on the lookout for this behavior nationwide, since the price of copper continues very high.

Bob McCown