Train Robbery for Amazon Packages? More Common Than You Think

Re:Train Robbery for Amazon Packages? More Common Than You T... by ExoticPearTree on Thursday January 25, 2024 @01:30AM (#39126817)

Well, since this is the US, what would be the incremental cost of package delivery if every train car would have an armed person shooting at anything that comes close to the tracks? A semi-automatic rifle and lots of ammo would deter a lot of people from atracking trains.

Not doing avout it anything hurts all the business that either have to refund customers or resend another item at their own expense.

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Re:Train Robbery for Amazon Packages? More Common Than You T... by treflop on Thursday January 25, 2024 @01:44AM (#39126895)

The train companies already know this. They’ve been fighting train robbers since the days of the Wild West.

I don’t know what other train companies are doing but Union Pacific cut a lot of its police force 3 years ago.

If they aren’t trying to hire more police, presumably they did the math and they must be making more money now than before regardless of any business they may now be losing.

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Re:Train Robbery for Amazon Packages? More Common Than You T... by chrisandchris on Thursday January 25, 2024 @01:33AM (#39126838)

Interesting how the US is seen as "will shoot at anything, if possible" while others try to think how a lock could work.

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Re:Train Robbery for Amazon Packages? More Common Than You T... by walthamstow on Thursday January 25, 2024 @01:59AM (#39126972)

Shooting from a train car is not something Americans are unfamiliar with, just ask the buffalo

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Re:Train Robbery for Amazon Packages? More Common Than You T... by ahtihn on Thursday January 25, 2024 @02:21AM (#39127094)

Why would lethal force be justified to protect packages? That's so excessive.

The punishment for theft isn't the death penalty even in the US last I checked.

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Re:Train Robbery for Amazon Packages? More Common Than You T... by yard2010 on Thursday January 25, 2024 @03:12AM (#39127356)

I would say robbing trains wild west style endangering everyone involved is excessive.

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Re:Train Robbery for Amazon Packages? More Common Than You T... by jon-wood on Thursday January 25, 2024 @06:38AM (#39128461)

This is people climbing into the cargo cars of incredibly slow moving trains and rummaging through some packages, not putting dynamite on a bridge and blowing it up to force the thing to stop.

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Re:Train Robbery for Amazon Packages? More Common Than You T... by analyte123 on Thursday January 25, 2024 @09:17AM (#39129778)

There are cases where it is considered justified, although it wouldn't apply to train heists, at least in California [1]. Some have claimed the justification to shoot someone for stealing at night in Texas has a biblical origin [2].

[1] https://reason.com/volokh/2020/06/02/are-people-allowed-to-u... [2] https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Exodus+22%3A2-3...

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Re:Train Robbery for Amazon Packages? More Common Than You T... by fransje26 on Thursday January 25, 2024 @06:05AM (#39128301)

I vote for M61s on automatic turrets with movement detection, on every carriage, alternating left-right. Pedestrians shot at railroad crossings is but a small, yet acceptable, price to pay for the safe transport of packages.

As the system will be expensive, it will have to be state-subsidized, of course. At the end of the day, the parcels services are providing an essential service of first necessity, and it would only make sense that everything is done at a national level to ensure they are functioning correctly.

And why stop there? We could also ask defense contractors to design specialized trains. On top of absolute safety, it will have the added benefit of creating good job opportunities!

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