On most railways in the world, the axles on pieces of rolling stock, especially older ones, had a plain bearing and is lubricated by a special box. This is usually called a Journal bearing. But sometimes, either due to failure of the equipment or due to friction, the box would run hot and would risk running the chance of starting a fire. Due to the relatively new nature of the trucks, the chances of a hot box were slim. That is until one day when Akemi had to pull a freight train from the Sanzu Harbor.
"Stupid tugs made me late!" said Akemi.
His train was running late and he had to make up for lost time.
"Go steady! Your going too fast!" said his firewoman.
"Don't mind him, Akane. I'll manage the regulator." replied the driver.
Akemi approached a signal and had to brake hard, he skidded across the rails for a few feet before stopping. Ahiru soon passed by Akemi with a passenger train. But Ahiru noticed some thin wisps of smoke coming from one of the trucks.
"Akemi!" called out Ahiru.
"One of your trucks are running hot!"
Akemi didn't hear Ahiru and was too busy thinking of his timetable to listen. He went down the mainline towards Mayohiga. The box went hotter still, by the time he stopped by the signalbox. Hiroto passed by with the express heading to the Hakurei Shrine. Hiroto smelled smoke and saw what was now a thickening pillar of black smoke.
"Driver! We need to stop at the next signalbox and tell them that Akemi's train is on fire." said Hiroto.
"Dully noted." replied his driver.
Akemi went farther out, but before he could get switched onto the Mayohiga extension. The train got heavy.
"That must be the brake van, what business does the guard have in me being more late!" thought Akemi.
But guard came to him and his crew in fit of coughing.
"The train's on fire!" gasped the guard.
"I'll tell the next signalbox that we need help." said the driver.
Before Akemi could ask what was going on, he smelled smoke.
"Oh no." said Akemi, realizing what was happening.
He went so long with the axle box so hot, that it had caught fire and had spread to the truck in front of it. The fire slowly spread as time slowly crawled by. But because Hiroto told the signalwoman ahead of him about the train; help quickly arrived. Shiro brought some tankers full of water and whatever humans and youkai came to help. The fire had taken up three trucks and using buckets, they slowly doused the flames. The guard used sand from the brake van to help put out the fire. But without a hose, the fire didn't go out until that evening.
The Scarlet Controller came out to see how bad things were, it was nearly dark enough for her not having to need a parasol to keep her out of the sun. Akemi's crew told her what had happened and she calculated her response.
"Akemi! If you stopped to let your crew check the um...what was it?"
"Axle box sir." said the driver.
"Axle box, whatever. If you did that, you wouldn't have to fight your fire!"
"Sorry sir." said Akemi.
"You wrecked perfectly good trucks. Next time, care more for your safety than the rigors of our schedule."
The next day, Nitori was told to design some railway fire fighting equipment. What she made was a water tank on a flatbed, with special pressurized hose, there's even a water cannon on the end of it if the fire ever got to be that bad. Now the railway could breath easy, now that some more safety measures were in place. Even if that did irk out Yukari because of her 'conflict of interest'.