We hear a lot about the challenge of electrified railways in the face of >extreme weather, and some on this group have expressed the idea that
OHLE is highly unreliable in extreme weather situations.
Yesterday an extremely strong storm system crossed Switzerland, and from
the Bielersee to the Bodensee, covering all the most densely populated
parts of the country, there was golfball sized hail and wind speeds with >gusts in excess of 100 km/h in many places. In my neighbourhood, several >houses within a couple of hundered meters of my home lost roofs, and at >least one shop had its plate glass window blown in. I was working from
home at the time, and the weather was positively frightening (I and my
home are save). In Aargau (the Canton I live in) a number of communities
are without power because transmission line towers were bent by the wind.
Aside from a few railway lines that suffered disruption due to trees or >branches blocking the tracks, the electrified SBB services were
essentially unaffected by the extreme weather, with the OHLE remaining >functional. Clearly it is possible to construct OHLE to be robust in the >face of extreme weather.
We hear a lot about the challenge of electrified railways in the face of extreme weather, and some on this group have expressed the idea that
OHLE is highly unreliable in extreme weather situations.
Yesterday an extremely strong storm system crossed Switzerland, and from
the Bielersee to the Bodensee, covering all the most densely populated
parts of the country, there was golfball sized hail and wind speeds with gusts in excess of 100 km/h in many places. In my neighbourhood, several houses within a couple of hundered meters of my home lost roofs, and at least one shop had its plate glass window blown in. I was working from
home at the time, and the weather was positively frightening (I and my
home are save). In Aargau (the Canton I live in) a number of communities
are without power because transmission line towers were bent by the wind.
Aside from a few railway lines that suffered disruption due to trees or branches blocking the tracks, the electrified SBB services were
essentially unaffected by the extreme weather, with the OHLE remaining functional. Clearly it is possible to construct OHLE to be robust in the face of extreme weather.
We hear a lot about the challenge of electrified railways in the face of extreme weather, and some on this group have expressed the idea that
OHLE is highly unreliable in extreme weather situations.
Yesterday an extremely strong storm system crossed Switzerland, and from
the Bielersee to the Bodensee, covering all the most densely populated
parts of the country, there was golfball sized hail and wind speeds with gusts in excess of 100 km/h in many places. In my neighbourhood, several houses within a couple of hundered meters of my home lost roofs, and at least one shop had its plate glass window blown in. I was working from
home at the time, and the weather was positively frightening (I and my
home are save). In Aargau (the Canton I live in) a number of communities
are without power because transmission line towers were bent by the wind.
Aside from a few railway lines that suffered disruption due to trees or branches blocking the tracks, the electrified SBB services were
essentially unaffected by the extreme weather, with the OHLE remaining functional. Clearly it is possible to construct OHLE to be robust in the face of extreme weather.
Aside from a few railway lines that suffered disruption due to trees or >branches blocking the tracks, the electrified SBB services were
essentially unaffected by the extreme weather, with the OHLE remaining >functional. Clearly it is possible to construct OHLE to be robust in
the face of extreme weather.
Yesterday an extremely strong storm system crossed Switzerland, and from
the Bielersee to the Bodensee, covering all the most densely populated
parts of the country, there was golfball sized hail and wind speeds with gusts in excess of 100 km/h in many places. In my neighbourhood, several houses within a couple of hundered meters of my home lost roofs, and at least one shop had its plate glass window blown in. I was working from
home at the time, and the weather was positively frightening (I and my
home are save). In Aargau (the Canton I live in) a number of communities
are without power because transmission line towers were bent by the wind.
On Sat, 29 Aug 2026 11:14:11 +0200
Bob <nospam@gmail.com> gabbled:
We hear a lot about the challenge of electrified railways in the face
of extreme weather, and some on this group have expressed the idea
that OHLE is highly unreliable in extreme weather situations.
Yesterday an extremely strong storm system crossed Switzerland, and
from the Bielersee to the Bodensee, covering all the most densely
populated parts of the country, there was golfball sized hail and wind
speeds with gusts in excess of 100 km/h in many places. In my
neighbourhood, several houses within a couple of hundered meters of my
home lost roofs, and at least one shop had its plate glass window
blown in. I was working from home at the time, and the weather was
positively frightening (I and my home are save). In Aargau (the Canton
I live in) a number of communities are without power because
transmission line towers were bent by the wind.
Aside from a few railway lines that suffered disruption due to trees
or branches blocking the tracks, the electrified SBB services were
essentially unaffected by the extreme weather, with the OHLE remaining
functional. Clearly it is possible to construct OHLE to be robust in
the face of extreme weather.
Do the trains run at 125mph though? IIRC there's a difference between
low and high speed catenary.
Of course if you want a truly robust electrifcationThe accident statistics indicate that the safety concerns are far from spurious. The very much higher cost of the electrical supply
system (other than during floods) you use 3rd rail but spurious "safety" reasons means its no longer considered in the UK or many other places
for low
speed services even though bottom contact 3rd rail is probably just as
save as 25kv OHLE. It should have been used in Wales for the valleys
lines but no,
they went for some overcomplicated and expensive gapped OHLE system with
the trains having to drag around tons of batteries to fill in the gaps.
In message <116u7t4$33lkv$1@dont-email.me>, at 11:14:11 on Sat, 29 Aug
2026, Bob <nospam@gmail.com> remarked:
Aside from a few railway lines that suffered disruption due to trees
or branches blocking the tracks, the electrified SBB services were
essentially unaffected by the extreme weather, with the OHLE remaining
functional. Clearly it is possible to construct OHLE to be robust in
the face of extreme weather.
It helps a bit that they are 15kV, rather than 25kV.
On 29/08/2026 11:30, Roland Perry wrote:
In message <116u7t4$33lkv$1@dont-email.me>, at 11:14:11 on Sat, 29 Aug 2026, Bob <nospam@gmail.com> remarked:
Aside from a few railway lines that suffered disruption due to trees
or branches blocking the tracks, the electrified SBB services were
essentially unaffected by the extreme weather, with the OHLE remaining
functional. Clearly it is possible to construct OHLE to be robust in
the face of extreme weather.
It helps a bit that they are 15kV, rather than 25kV.
Not meaningfully. By the time you are at 15 kV the mechanical loading
rather than electrical properties of the OHLE become the limiting factor
on the size/weight of the components, so the physical OHLE is
essentially the same for both. Only the insulators and clearances are impacted by the difference.
On 29/08/2026 10:14, Bob wrote:
We hear a lot about the challenge of electrified railways in the face
of extreme weather, and some on this group have expressed the idea
that OHLE is highly unreliable in extreme weather situations.
Yesterday an extremely strong storm system crossed Switzerland, and
from the Bielersee to the Bodensee, covering all the most densely
populated parts of the country, there was golfball sized hail and wind
speeds with gusts in excess of 100 km/h in many places. In my
neighbourhood, several houses within a couple of hundered meters of my
home lost roofs, and at least one shop had its plate glass window
blown in. I was working from home at the time, and the weather was
positively frightening (I and my home are save). In Aargau (the Canton
I live in) a number of communities are without power because
transmission line towers were bent by the wind.
I'm pleased to hear you and your property is safe.
Aside from a few railway lines that suffered disruption due to trees
or branches blocking the tracks, the electrified SBB services were
essentially unaffected by the extreme weather, with the OHLE remaining
functional. Clearly it is possible to construct OHLE to be robust in
the face of extreme weather.
The quality of UK OHLE is dependent on the amount of money UK government
was prepared to spend at the time.
The ECML was done on the cheap and we're paying the price.
The incomplete GW electrification seems to be sturdy enough and problems
are rare.
Bob <nospam@gmail.com> wrote:
We hear a lot about the challenge of electrified railways in the face of
extreme weather, and some on this group have expressed the idea that
OHLE is highly unreliable in extreme weather situations.
Yesterday an extremely strong storm system crossed Switzerland, and from
the Bielersee to the Bodensee, covering all the most densely populated
parts of the country, there was golfball sized hail and wind speeds with
gusts in excess of 100 km/h in many places. In my neighbourhood, several
houses within a couple of hundered meters of my home lost roofs, and at
least one shop had its plate glass window blown in. I was working from
home at the time, and the weather was positively frightening (I and my
home are save). In Aargau (the Canton I live in) a number of communities
are without power because transmission line towers were bent by the wind.
Aside from a few railway lines that suffered disruption due to trees or
branches blocking the tracks, the electrified SBB services were
essentially unaffected by the extreme weather, with the OHLE remaining
functional. Clearly it is possible to construct OHLE to be robust in the
face of extreme weather.
I don?t recall that Switzerland has particularly massive OHLE
infrastructure (certainly nothing like the GWML, whose structures were designed by the Swiss, but aren?t Swiss-style). I assume it has very solid foundations. Maybe Switzerland has a particularly resilient power transmission network, perhaps with multiple redundancy? Or are Swiss railways just very quick to fix things?
On 29/08/2026 11:37, boltar@caprica.universe wrote:
On Sat, 29 Aug 2026 11:14:11 +0200
Bob <nospam@gmail.com> gabbled:
We hear a lot about the challenge of electrified railways in the face
of extreme weather, and some on this group have expressed the idea
that OHLE is highly unreliable in extreme weather situations.
Yesterday an extremely strong storm system crossed Switzerland, and
from the Bielersee to the Bodensee, covering all the most densely
populated parts of the country, there was golfball sized hail and wind
speeds with gusts in excess of 100 km/h in many places. In my
neighbourhood, several houses within a couple of hundered meters of my
home lost roofs, and at least one shop had its plate glass window
blown in. I was working from home at the time, and the weather was
positively frightening (I and my home are save). In Aargau (the Canton
I live in) a number of communities are without power because
transmission line towers were bent by the wind.
Aside from a few railway lines that suffered disruption due to trees
or branches blocking the tracks, the electrified SBB services were
essentially unaffected by the extreme weather, with the OHLE remaining
functional. Clearly it is possible to construct OHLE to be robust in
the face of extreme weather.
Do the trains run at 125mph though? IIRC there's a difference between
low and high speed catenary.
The Olten-Bern line is 200 km/h.
On 29/08/2026 11:41, Recliner wrote:
Bob <nospam@gmail.com> wrote:
We hear a lot about the challenge of electrified railways in the face of >> extreme weather, and some on this group have expressed the idea that
OHLE is highly unreliable in extreme weather situations.
Yesterday an extremely strong storm system crossed Switzerland, and from >> the Bielersee to the Bodensee, covering all the most densely populated
parts of the country, there was golfball sized hail and wind speeds with >> gusts in excess of 100 km/h in many places. In my neighbourhood, several >> houses within a couple of hundered meters of my home lost roofs, and at
least one shop had its plate glass window blown in. I was working from
home at the time, and the weather was positively frightening (I and my
home are save). In Aargau (the Canton I live in) a number of communities >> are without power because transmission line towers were bent by the wind. >>
Aside from a few railway lines that suffered disruption due to trees or
branches blocking the tracks, the electrified SBB services were
essentially unaffected by the extreme weather, with the OHLE remaining
functional. Clearly it is possible to construct OHLE to be robust in the >> face of extreme weather.
I don?t recall that Switzerland has particularly massive OHLE infrastructure (certainly nothing like the GWML, whose structures were designed by the Swiss, but aren?t Swiss-style). I assume it has very solid foundations. Maybe Switzerland has a particularly resilient power transmission network, perhaps with multiple redundancy? Or are Swiss railways just very quick to fix things?
The size of the GWML structures was more dictated by the desire to
enable the installation to be done without restricting the active use of
the railway line, hence placing the supports and supporting structures
far enough from the tracks to enable their erection next to an active railway line, and for standard pre-fabricated components to be used,
rather than fabrication of structures in-situ. Steel is cheap, closing railway lines is expensive.
On 29/08/2026 11:41, Recliner wrote:
Bob <nospam@gmail.com> wrote:
We hear a lot about the challenge of electrified railways in the face of >>> extreme weather, and some on this group have expressed the idea that
OHLE is highly unreliable in extreme weather situations.
Yesterday an extremely strong storm system crossed Switzerland, and from >>> the Bielersee to the Bodensee, covering all the most densely populated
parts of the country, there was golfball sized hail and wind speeds with >>> gusts in excess of 100 km/h in many places. In my neighbourhood, several >>> houses within a couple of hundered meters of my home lost roofs, and at
least one shop had its plate glass window blown in. I was working from
home at the time, and the weather was positively frightening (I and my
home are save). In Aargau (the Canton I live in) a number of communities >>> are without power because transmission line towers were bent by the wind. >>>
Aside from a few railway lines that suffered disruption due to trees or
branches blocking the tracks, the electrified SBB services were
essentially unaffected by the extreme weather, with the OHLE remaining
functional. Clearly it is possible to construct OHLE to be robust in the >>> face of extreme weather.
I don?t recall that Switzerland has particularly massive OHLE
infrastructure (certainly nothing like the GWML, whose structures were
designed by the Swiss, but aren?t Swiss-style). I assume it has very solid >> foundations. Maybe Switzerland has a particularly resilient power
transmission network, perhaps with multiple redundancy? Or are Swiss
railways just very quick to fix things?
The size of the GWML structures was more dictated by the desire to
enable the installation to be done without restricting the active use of
the railway line, hence placing the supports and supporting structures
far enough from the tracks to enable their erection next to an active railway line, and for standard pre-fabricated components to be used,
rather than fabrication of structures in-situ. Steel is cheap, closing railway lines is expensive.
Aside from a few railway lines that suffered disruption due to trees
or branches blocking the tracks, the electrified SBB services were >>essentially unaffected by the extreme weather, with the OHLE remaining >>functional. Clearly it is possible to construct OHLE to be robust in
the face of extreme weather.
Do the trains run at 125mph though?
The ECML was done on the cheap and we're paying the price.
The incomplete GW electrification seems to be sturdy enough and
problems are rare.
Indeed. I am offering this example due to the claims by some voices
that it is simply not possible to construct OHLE to be robust against
severe weather
In message <116u97r$3447g$1@dont-email.me>, at 09:37:00 on Sat, 29 Aug
2026, boltar@caprica.universe remarked:
Aside from a few railway lines that suffered disruption due to trees
or branches blocking the tracks, the electrified SBB services were >>essentially unaffected by the extreme weather, with the OHLE remaining >>functional. Clearly it is possible to construct OHLE to be robust in
the face of extreme weather.
Do the trains run at 125mph though?
That's a very good point. I also suspect that not many of the SBB lines cross peat bogs.
On 29/08/2026 11:38, Martin wrote:
On 29/08/2026 10:14, Bob wrote:
We hear a lot about the challenge of electrified railways in the face
of extreme weather, and some on this group have expressed the idea
that OHLE is highly unreliable in extreme weather situations.
Yesterday an extremely strong storm system crossed Switzerland, and
from the Bielersee to the Bodensee, covering all the most densely
populated parts of the country, there was golfball sized hail and wind
speeds with gusts in excess of 100 km/h in many places. In my
neighbourhood, several houses within a couple of hundered meters of my
home lost roofs, and at least one shop had its plate glass window
blown in. I was working from home at the time, and the weather was
positively frightening (I and my home are save). In Aargau (the Canton
I live in) a number of communities are without power because
transmission line towers were bent by the wind.
I'm pleased to hear you and your property is safe.
Thanks. It is interesting watching the difference in UK vs CH approaches
to safety during the clean up phase. As I walked around looking at the >damage, there is a shop that had a long stretch of its branded hoarding >hanging off the wall across the front door, partially blocking the
entrance. As I walked past, a customer emerged from the shop with their >puprchases, climbed over the wreckage and went about their day. So far
as I can tell the shop never closed.
Aside from a few railway lines that suffered disruption due to trees
or branches blocking the tracks, the electrified SBB services were
essentially unaffected by the extreme weather, with the OHLE remaining
functional. Clearly it is possible to construct OHLE to be robust in
the face of extreme weather.
The quality of UK OHLE is dependent on the amount of money UK government
was prepared to spend at the time.
The ECML was done on the cheap and we're paying the price.
The incomplete GW electrification seems to be sturdy enough and problems
are rare.
Indeed. I am offering this example due to the claims by some voices that
it is simply not possible to construct OHLE to be robust against severe >weather, and consequently in places where strong winds exist, OHLE based >electrification is impossible. This event offers a clear counter example >that OHLE is entirely possible to be made resilient against such
weather. As the weather event took place mid morning (it passed by me at >around 10.00, it was earlier in the west and later in the east, but all >during the normal working day when trains were running at their usual >weekday frequencies), there were trains running throughout, so it was
not the case that trains were stopped (on another internet discussion
group a driver on the Zrich S-Bahn posted his experience of driving
through the extreme weather).
It occurs to me that we are confusing two different causes of OHLE fragility: weather (mainly high winds) and train pans
bringing down the wires. In the UK, I don't recall that we have particular problems with winds bringing down the wires,
with the possible exception of the ECML headspans, but we seem to have regular problems with misbehaving pans bringing
down the knitting. If that happens in a headspan area, then all the wires come down, not just one track's.
I don't know if our trains have unusually badly behaved pans, or are our conductor wires more fragile?
On 29/08/2026 11:37, boltar@caprica.universe wrote:
Of course if you want a truly robust electrifcationThe accident statistics indicate that the safety concerns are far from >spurious. The very much higher cost of the electrical supply
system (other than during floods) you use 3rd rail but spurious "safety"
reasons means its no longer considered in the UK or many other places
for low
speed services even though bottom contact 3rd rail is probably just as
save as 25kv OHLE. It should have been used in Wales for the valleys
lines but no,
they went for some overcomplicated and expensive gapped OHLE system with
the trains having to drag around tons of batteries to fill in the gaps.
infrastructure for low voltage supplies imposed by the limited
clearances of 3rd rail make that system prohibitively expensive outside
of short but high intensity metro type situations. There is no way you
could power heavy freight up the ramps to the old Gotthard tunnel using
3rd rail.
The very much higher cost of the electrical supply
infrastructure for low voltage supplies imposed by the limited
clearances of 3rd rail make that system prohibitively expensive outside
of short but high intensity metro type situations. There is no way you
could power heavy freight up the ramps to the old Gotthard tunnel using
3rd rail.
Bob <nospam@gmail.com> posted:
The very much higher cost of the electrical supply
infrastructure for low voltage supplies imposed by the limited
clearances of 3rd rail make that system prohibitively expensive outside
of short but high intensity metro type situations. There is no way you
could power heavy freight up the ramps to the old Gotthard tunnel using
3rd rail.
That's why there were never heavy freight trains up to
Modane from Chamb?ry, which is IIRC steeper on the high
section, before the introduction of OHLE on the given
line.
Ulf Kutzner formulated the question :
Bob <nospam@gmail.com> posted:
The very much higher cost of the electrical supply
infrastructure for low voltage supplies imposed by the limited
clearances of 3rd rail make that system prohibitively expensive outside >> of short but high intensity metro type situations. There is no way you
could power heavy freight up the ramps to the old Gotthard tunnel using >> 3rd rail.
That's why there were never heavy freight trains up to
Modane from Chambry, which is IIRC steeper on the high
section, before the introduction of OHLE on the given
line.
Note that in that case, OHLE vs. third rail does makes very little
difference in terms of available power, as the 3rd rail was also
energized at 1,5 kV DC, like the current catenary. The reason there
were no heavy freight trains on that line
was more due to the fact
that only old and low powered locomotives were available,
until they
adapted a few CC6500 locs with 3rd rail shoes. And even now, with
the OHLE, the load of the trains on this section remains severely
restricted.
But there were lots of enginerring works, other closures,
I guess most of the rail freight between France and Italy
and vice versa is now routed via Switzerland.
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