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A railway track in Lgov, Kursk region, was damaged by Ukrainian forces, according to the local mayor. (sopuli.xyz)
submitted 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
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https://t.me/astrapress/62997

Ukrainian Armed Forces strike railway tracks in Kursk's Lgov, says mayor

According to Klemeshov, four arrivals were recorded in the city. Two residential buildings and the railway tracks of the Lgov-Kyiv station were damaged. There was also a fire in a warehouse of one of the city's factories. No residents were injured.

“I do not recommend that anyone who left the city return until the situation has finally stabilized,” the mayor wrote.

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[–] [email protected] 24 points 2 months ago (3 children)

(Obligatory youtube)

[–] [email protected] 8 points 2 months ago (2 children)

Additional:

This is what it takes to break up actual railroads: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Railroad_plough

Note that these things were pulled by two locomotives, and moved at roughly a brisk walking pace. It's VERY hard to destroy a railroad.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 2 months ago (1 children)

In use, the plough is lowered to rip up the middle of the track as it is hauled along by a locomotive. This action breaks the wooden ties (sleepers) which forces the steel rails out of alignment, making the line impassable by later rail vehicles.

In a lot of places the wood has been replaced by reinforced concrete, I’m not sure if the ploughs can be used anymore.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 months ago

I'm not a railroad person, but the locomotives have gotten bigger too

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

A much safer (for the perpetrators) and effective way would be to unscrew a number of the locking bolts, which could be done at night, in silence, even with hand tools, on the outward side of the rails in a curve.

I live near a train station, and over a number of days they replaced hundreds of the traverses, in place, working at night. Simply unbolting a few tens I think would make the trick. Having a few cargo trains derail could wreak major havoc.

If combined with a couple of cuts to the track (easily done with a battery angle grinder, under a 100€) the damage would be amplified.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Cool vid.. thanks for sharing. My takeaway is that this sabotage will do nothing.

[–] [email protected] 17 points 2 months ago

Slowing them down and damageing carts is worth while. And accumulates as they do multiple passes on broken rail. Not to mention needing more patrols to catch the Ukrainians doing this. The game is about attrition and headache.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Was just thinking about this. Probably can't run high speed over that section of track, but it surely won't halt operations

[–] [email protected] 6 points 2 months ago

That's a section of track where the break has been found and documented. At the very least, significant damage that is suspected to be related to sabotage would require additional thorough inspection of the surrounding railway.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 2 months ago

So the real victory here isn't damaging the rail line, its the fact that it was done somewhere unexpected and without any sign of the culprits, a few more times and you create a culture of paranoia around rail safety that slows down rail based logistics all along the border with Ukraine. Rather similar to exploding rats

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 months ago

Oops

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 months ago (1 children)

I like how this is news and is seen as a victory. Not hating or anything, but funny because give me an angle grinder and I can do the same damage as what I’m assuming was a device made for warfare.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 2 months ago (3 children)

You could do it with a hacksaw, if you had enough replacement blades. And you could do it with an arsenal of bastard files as well. Each iteration on the idea takes considerably more time and effort, though. Those rails are quite a bit tougher than you might realize.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

Yeah I know, railroad tracks are extremely hard steel. Just poking fun

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 months ago

Battery operated angle grinders are plentiful (noisy though).

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 months ago

Can you not use some form of explosive charge

[–] [email protected] -3 points 2 months ago (4 children)

Those tracks look like wood🤨 That can't be normal, right?

[–] [email protected] 9 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

Hardened steel is used for railway tracks because it's more wear resistant, but it's also more brittle and prone to failure along grain boundaries.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 2 months ago (2 children)

Are you talking about the planks the track's laid on? Pretty normal for that to be wood actually. The AMTRACK tracks in the USA DC area are all like that.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 2 months ago

This particular rail system is pretty clearly using reinforced concrete ties.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 months ago

It's concrete. The destroyed one shows the reinforced rebars

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

The sleepers are reinforced concrete, the rails are very, very strengthened steel. It looks like wood because of the way it failed.

This is gore for me.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 months ago

What?