This 1970s color film produced by the Herb Golden Organization for Dynamic Sciences.

This sponsored film was filmed in cooperation with the Federal Railroad Administration’s Office of Rail Safety Research, with Frank Capra, Jr. credited as Executive Producer. The film looks at safety problems related to railroad gas petroleum tank cars, and shows innovative developments that will make them safer by using thermal insulation techniques. Findings of the U.S. Ballistic Research Laboratory were used to develop these concepts, with the hope being that the disastrous effects of collision and derailment-related chain explosions could be mitigated. The research uses slow motion techniques to document the investigation and its related experiments (TRT 21:33).

Opening titles, “U.S. Army ARRADCOM” — U.S. Army Armament Research and Development Center — and “Ballistic Research Laboratory” (BRL) (0:07). A diesel locomotive freight train pulling tank cars (0:17). A train derailment and wreck. A punctured, derailed tank car emitting flames. Then, an enormous explosion. Wreckage and debris (0:42). Large tanks of gas are transported across a wide-open plain via truck, for a government test. The test tank is shown in an excavated pit. Passing freight cars in a train yard, on railroad tracks (0:59). Exterior: Ballistic Research Laboratory. Flaming scenes of accidental explosions (1:42). An Exxon gas filling station. Warning signs: “Flammable Gas, Liquefied Petroleum Gas” and “Dangerous, Propane, Handle Carefully.” Exploded pipeline (2:14). Firefighters in red uniforms and hardhats. A destroyed brick building. A gas explosion (2:46). A freight car collides with a tank car, triggering a controlled explosion in slow motion test footage (3:08). A dented tank car. A firefighter sprays water from an elevated fire truck ladder. A tank car section in a residential area. More ground blasts and fireballs (3:30). Smouldering wreckage and mushroom clouds. Aerial photography. Firemen arrive late to the smoky scene of a chaotic accident. A man, blackened by soot, removes his jacket (4:25). Research and development of small prototype tanks in White Sands, New Mexico. A man illustrates a physics equation on a chalkboard at the Transportation Systems Center in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Toy model trains reenact a collision. Testing a flame-retardant metal under high heat (5:17). An excavated site at White Sands Missile Range. A crane lifts a 1:5 scale tank into position onto a pipeline (5:50). A full-size test tank arrives at White Sands. A fire ignites and gas is burned off without exploding the tank (6:21). An animated illustration of the test depicts a flaming tank car emitting gas (7:52). “After 24 1/2 minutes,” an explosion (8:41). A blast crater (9:07). A second test car is sanded and painted with weather-resistant coating for insulation. Title cards over a burn indicate additional time bought by the added insulation. Stills reveal tanks left intact (9:43). A locomotive crosses an elevated coastal bridge (11:36). Chalkboard illustrations show a radiating blast resulting from a tank puncture (11:55). A torch simulator is constructed and demonstrated at the Transportation Test Center (TTCI) in Pueblo, Colorado (12:15). Thermal coated sections of metal are shown before and after extended blowtorching. A real tank car is torched. Superimposed titles boast extended reaction times (13:38). A woman types at an early computer in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Magnetic tape memory drives. Aerial footage of the TTCI. A wide shot of a test collision in slow motion. Closeups of train car coupling (14:26). A grid is superimposed for analysis. A trapezoidal shield and a double-shelf coupler are installed (16:29). The shield prevents a puncture. The new coupler prevents separation (18:20). A successful test crash and review of previous scenes (19:30). An oncoming train approaches a railroad crossing. End titles (20:40).

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This film is part of the Periscope Film LLC archive, one of the largest historic military, transportation, and aviation stock footage collections in the USA. Entirely film backed, this material is available for licensing in 24p HD, 2k and 4k. For more information visit http://www.PeriscopeFilm.com