Why did the Qinghai-Tibet Railway introduce American locomotives instead of domestic locomotives? Still a technical problem?

With the progress of social media platform, the era of short video has arrived. A while ago, many tourists set off a "trip to Hoh Xil" craze. This Hoh Xil is a no-man's land in Tibet and one of the many no-man's land where the Qinghai-Tibet Railway passes. The Qinghai-Tibet Railway has created many records in the history of railway transportation in Tibet, and it is still the plateau railway with the highest altitude and the longest mileage in the world. The construction of Qinghai-Tibet Railway has faced three major world problems: frozen soil that has been difficult to solve for thousands of years; Cold and oxygen-deficient environment; The ecological environment is fragile. How difficult is it to build the Qinghai-Tibet Railway? How did our China engineering team solve these three world problems? Why has the Qinghai-Tibet Railway been built so hard and criticized by foreign media as an "American locomotive"? Let me explain it to you in detail.

The Qinghai-Tibet Railway starts from Xining City, Qinghai Province, and runs from east to west to Lhasa City, Tibet, with a total length of thousands of miles. The famous Qinghai-Tibet Railway was built from Xining, Qinghai to Lhasa, the capital of Tibet. As we all know, knowing yourself and yourself is invincible. In order to build the Qinghai-Tibet Railway, China engineering team must go to the field to investigate the geological conditions. Before starting, the engineering team encountered the first problem: frozen soil. Because the temperature of the land is below zero for a long time, frozen soil is formed by the combination of soil and ice for many years. However, frozen soil is also very particular, which can be roughly divided into seasonal frozen soil and short-term frozen soil. The influence of two kinds of frozen soil on railway construction is different, so the construction team should first distinguish which part is which kind of frozen soil before the next construction.

Besides frozen soil, the second most important thing is the ecological environment. There are many wild animals in Tibetan areas, most of which are national and protected animals, so the construction of the Qinghai-Tibet Railway will not affect their original lives. If the construction of railways leads to the extinction of animals, it will not be worth the loss. In order to solve two kinds of brain burning problems, our engineering team has adopted a variety of innovative means, such as sheet ventilation. These measures not only solve the complexity of frozen soil, but also will not affect the original ecology.

Therefore, the engineering team had to work hard while overcoming altitude sickness. However, where does altitude sickness mean that it can be overcome? Lighter people will be dizzy, weak and dying. At this point, the state is very considerate. For the safety of construction workers, the state spared no expense, not only providing relevant facilities for construction workers, but also sending medical teams to the plateau with the construction team. For decades, hundreds of thousands of people died, which was called "the miracle in the history of plateau medicine" at that time.

After a lot of hardships, we finally got through the Qinghai-Tibet railway trunk line, and we realized the impossible in the mouth of foreign media! But even so, I can't stop questioning China's infrastructure. Some foreign media claimed: What will happen if China builds the Qinghai-Tibet Railway? If there were no American locomotives, wouldn't it still be impossible to drive on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau? No, China's infrastructure strength hit them in the face, so they looked for a sense of existence elsewhere. So as foreign media said, you can't drive on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau without American locomotives?

That was not the case. In the year when the Qinghai-Tibet Railway was opened to traffic, that is, in 2006, China had already developed a special locomotive for the plateau. However, since the Qinghai-Tibet Railway was the first railway leading to the plateau in China, we were very cautious in all aspects of the Qinghai-Tibet Railway, so we finally chose the American locomotive. In the final analysis, it is because American locomotives are more suitable for trains bound for the Qinghai-Tibet Railway. Think about it carefully, it is necessary to ensure that the train runs at full capacity and bear the cold of the plateau.

American NJ2 locomotive can not only withstand low enough temperature, but also adjust the dynamic function of the train during the elevation rise of Qinghai-Tibet Railway. At that time, American NJ2 locomotive was the best choice. If the use of American locomotives can better ensure the normal operation of the Qinghai-Tibet Railway, China will naturally not choose American locomotives because of unexpected media opinions. But this doesn't mean that it can't be opened to traffic without using American locomotives, and domestic locomotives are enough to be opened to traffic. As a big country, we will naturally have the demeanor of a big country, and we also admit that our technology is not as good as others, but if we insist on saying these things, we will never suffer indignities.