Of All The Things to Steal.....

[Lackadaisical2]

Oh, there were two 900 lb rails?

Double my numbers then.

Yeah, sorted that part out already. I didn't feel like doing actual math or, apparently, letting google do it for me so I guessed at what the haul would be by figuring what they'd get per 100 lb but for some reason decided that that only moved the decimal one place. Then I used sarcasm to explain what I did. Then I did this. And now we are here.

Exactly.

[The Corparation]

Hey now, you can go about moving the decimals over two spaces like they're 'supposed' to (there were two 900 pound rails, unless I got that wrong too) but I clearly don't truck with that kind wreckless nonsense...

Oh, there were two 900 lb rails?

Double my numbers then.

Actually they only took one, the other was left behind a few hundered feet from the track.

[Psychotic Catholics]

Wouldn't it be fairly easier to take the guardrails from a street / highway, etc.?

Really, these guys went all out.

Probably not as valuable, and presumably you'd have less time because traffic doesn't exactly stop at night. Trains run on schedules, and I doubt it's hard to get a copy of one or figure it out.

I was actually considering the difficulty of removing a guardrail, as opposed to railroad track.

[Coffee Cakes]

You don't live in Massachusetts do you? The whole state deserves a Darwin Award.

Just a bit north, actually. A little over an hour from Boston.

New Hampshire > Massachusetts.

Lucky stiff.

[Indeos]

Probably not as valuable, and presumably you'd have less time because traffic doesn't exactly stop at night. Trains run on schedules, and I doubt it's hard to get a copy of one or figure it out.

I was actually considering the difficulty of removing a guardrail, as opposed to railroad track.

It'd be relatively easy, but you'd have to do it quick and probably get lucky.

@CC: We are pretty awesome up here in NH, but it's boring as all hell.

[Girkil]

I guess someone got fed up with collecting cans for scrap

Seriously Criminals?

[Imperium Neo Roma]

Terrorists

No, not Terrorists, probably just some dumbasses who thought it'd be funny to pull such a prank.

[Antilon]

Reminds me of the time my brother tried to forge a sword by heating an iron weight bar over the stove top and banging it with a hammer against a huge rock he stole from the neighbors...

Idiots at work make the best stories.

[Wilgrove]

Reminds me of the time my brother tried to forge a sword by heating an iron weight bar over the stove top and banging it with a hammer against a huge rock he stole from the neighbors...

Idiots at work make the best stories.

Did you video tape it?

[Grave_n_idle]

I like it; I've always fantasized about having a railroad in my backyard, and these odd men fulfilled my dream.

I don't see why its so baffling; Stealing railroad tracks is rarely done, so they wanted to do it. Not an entirely difficult concept.

Well it's baffling because 1. It's 900lbs, this isn't something you can just pick up and throw into the bed of a pick up truck and people won't notice it. Which brings me to my second point, how do they expect people to not notice that they're carrying around a 900lbs railroad track? Third, railroad tracks has to withstand some serious pressure and weights when trains ride over them, so we're talking very strong steel, you would need something more powerful than the welder's torch you can buy at Lowe's to cut this piece of steel out. Not to mention that you also have to pull up railroad spikes that hold the rail to the ties.

It seems like an excessive amount of work to just score drug money.

On the other hand, if you assume a two-man crew spent a couple of hours doing it, and that they had a dealer already set up to 'recycle' it for, say, $450 - they would each have made more than $100 per hour (tax free) for some manual labour.

I think the drugs are a red herring, here.

[Soviet Haaregrad]

I smell a new career.

[Lackadaisical2]

I smell a new career.

Apparently it'll double as a good workout too.

[Futurephilosostan]

Metal is expensive. Scrap yards don't always ask many questions. Easy money. Although Steel isn't a big taker. The drug money bit is just the cop stereotyping and blaming drugs for every problem.The thieves may also of thought the line was abandoned

Exactly.
Maybe in US it's rarer, but here it happens once in a while. Some people in dire need of cash steal any metal that they think can sell: cables, street signs, drainage pipes... it's just a usual small-crime. A little bit stupid in this case (high risk; low reward), but meh

[Pope Joan]

I had a client who stole the magnetic flashing light from the top of a police car.

It was parked in front of his house because they were asking his parents about his theft of 100 pounds of copper wire from the high school.

[JuNii]

This is just....baffling....

not as baffling as this theft...

[Maurepas]

Makes me think of the time I gave serious consideration to stealing people's copper piping, heh heh. I didn't do it of course, but it was an amusing thought.

Though, I am still a bit peeved my friend didn't let me cannibalize his computers for the copper, he ended up just throwing them out, what a waste.

[Hardened Pyrokinetics]

I had a client who stole the magnetic flashing light from the top of a police car.

It was parked in front of his house because they were asking his parents about his theft of 100 pounds of copper wire from the high school.

... Oh jegus, I can't stop laughing!

[Nightkill the Emperor]

No, you need Zombie Teddy Roosevelt, he'd take the piece of rail and kill the thieves with it!

Segata Sanshiro

Nobody got the reference, huh?

[Hardened Pyrokinetics]

Segata Sanshiro

Nobody got the reference, huh?

Apparently not.

<sigh> Such is life...

[Nightkill the Emperor]

Nobody got the reference, huh?

Apparently not.

<sigh> Such is life...

Discworld.

[Episarta]

Maybe they needed the piece of track to replace one they stole further down the line. Like at the begining of the first Indiana Jones movie. It is so obvious that I am surprised the police hadn't thought of it.

[Dyakovo]

So someone cuts out about 900lbs of railroad tracks, and my first question is....why? I mean assuming that druggies have done this, who are they going to sell it to?

A scrap yard.

[Naurobia]

They probably took it to a junkyard and made a few hundred dollars off of it. Either way lets just hope the people responsible for this are caught and prosecuted to the full extent of law. People could have been killed

[HC Eredivisie]

I would have thought that the train system would have a way of telling if rails were missing ahead of time...but then, I guess I really wouldn't know how that would work. Sending signals along the rails? I don't know, I'm just the idea man...

Which, to my knowlegde of US trains, is in use.

[Ramalet]

I would have thought that the train system would have a way of telling if rails were missing ahead of time...but then, I guess I really wouldn't know how that would work. Sending signals along the rails? I don't know, I'm just the idea man...

Maybe they didn't think anyone would be stupid enough to try and steal a 900lb piece of steel from a railway line?