(Image source from: latestly.com)

As the extreme cold is swirling over the United States, quite a lot public service organizations have had to take serious steps to tackle the effects triggered by bitterly cold winds.

In order to prevent tracks from being damaged, Chicago, which has been reeling under record freezing temperatures saw workers of its train transit system resort to setting the tracks on fire.

Over the past couple of days, flames were seen on the tracks of Chicago's Metra commuter rail system as the city saw temperatures dip to -27 degrees Celsius. Along with this, a wind chill warning was in effect until noon on Thursday with wind chills as low as -50 degrees Celsius.

To fight the effects of such extreme cold conditions, Metra rail explained that it involved a system of a series of underground gas pipes designed particularly to heat the train tracks. Flames, in reality, come from gas-fed heaters that run alongside the tracks and keep them warm. This system is deployed to prevent the tracks from experiencing "pull-apart."

Metra in a recent Instagram post said the extreme cold shrinks the tracks which are made of metal and the rails literally pull apart from each other. Heating the tracks with fire expands the metal until the two rails can be put back together again.

 

 

 

View this post on Instagram

Pull-aparts are rail defects in which two rails separate at their connection. They occur in extreme cold when the metal shrinks and the rails literally pull apart from each other. How Metra forces make repairs is by warming the metal with fire until it expands and the two rails can be reconnected.Photo: Mark Llanuza . . . #metra #metrarail #trains #traingram #locomotive #railroad #railway #workingontherailroad #traintracks #hardhatarea #fightingwithfire #railfan #lovetransit #ontherailroad

A post shared by Metra (@metrarail) on Jan 21, 2019 at 12:39pm PST

Metra rail deploys its crew members who work 12-hour shifts to oversee the flames. Trains are running on the tracks even while the flames are burning.

According to Metra rail, it is safe to run the trains over the flames because the diesel fuel in the trains "combusts only with pressure and heat, not open flames."

On its website, the rail organization also recounts that in days of old when the gas-pipe system did not yet exist, the winter crew employed a far more basic system for heating the tracks. Workers carried “smudge pots" which was filled with kerosene, they would then place them in the spaces between the track ties and light them. This was all done by hand.

“We all used to carry this stuff, I called it skunk oil,” said John Meyer, director of engineering for the Milwaukee District. “We poured it in a two-gallon (8 liters) can poured it out, and threw a match in it, and it’d start a fire along with all the rails. We’re talking in the mid-70s. Nowadays you’d get in big trouble doing that.”

-Sowmya Sangam