Word: railroaded
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...problems involve the transportation of chemicals. In elaborate detail, the Department of Transportation has compiled regulations for the handling of 3,000 dangerous products. Says Thomas Charlton, chief of the standards division in the department's office of hazardous materials: "We regulate every container from laboratory jars to railroad tank cars...
Trucks used for shipping chemicals must be strong enough to survive a rollover without breaking open, and tank cars a derailment. Hydrogen cyanide, a lethal poison, can be transported only in carriers with 1-in.-thick, high-strength steel bulkheads. When a railroad car carrying petrochemicals overturns, the reason may be loose rails, which can break off from their ties and puncture the front of an oncoming tank car. Therefore, industry rules were established that call for adding more insulation and head shields. Cost: $452 million...
Many regulations for transporting dangerous materials have been born of disasters. In 1978, 23 cars of a slow-moving Louisville and Nashville train derailed in Waverly, Tenn. A day later, a tanker containing propane exploded, killing 16 railroad workers, Government officials and bystanders, and injuring 30 others. Investigators learned that a railroad wheel had broken and had sent the cars off the track. Later, the Government banned that type of wheel from use on trains carrying hazardous materials...
...removed from shelves in anticipation of price increases. To hedge against shortages or inflation, many citizens withdrew their savings to purchase such nonperishables as bicycles and textiles. One Peking family bought a piano as an investment, though neither parents nor children could play it. A black market developed in railroad tickets, as speculators in Peking, Shanghai, Canton and other cities snapped up tickets and resold them at higher prices...
...some of the real computer whiz kids are finally getting their due. In a new book called Hackers (Doubleday; $17.95), Writer Steven Levy argues that these "science-mad people" are the true heroes of the computer revolution. He traces the history of hackers from M.I.T.'s Tech Model Railroad Club, their first mecca, to Silicon Valley's Homebrew Computer Club, an early microcomputer gathering spot, to a video-game factory in Coarsegold, Calif. Through it all he discerns a common thread: the unspoken assumption among crack computer programmers and engineers that they could straighten out the world...