Some other photographs from the October 22nd trip have been posted online. No surprise, people who are not riding and have time to get proper shots and locations and aren't using a cell phone and have a drone take noticeably better photos.
Some other photographs from the October 22nd trip have been posted online. No surprise, people who are not riding and have time to get proper shots and locations and aren't using a cell phone and have a drone take noticeably better photos.
NickD, your selection of vintage photographs are amazing and your writing explains the context so well. Wonderful! Do you have any insights on Southern and the "Magic City?" I went to Birmingham and back from N.O. in 1977? Everything was tired and faded, but the employees still gave their best. I loved it as a youngster.
The Frisco Silver Dollar Line has been operating since 1962. Wednesday on the way to the robbers' cabin, it derailed. First one in a theme park?
Hmmm.... Looking at that again, did it derail or fall off the carriage?
In reply to 914Driver :
From what those in the industry have been saying, just going off the photos, it looks like the lead car derail towards the inside of the curve, and then the wheels either caught on the guard rail or a tie and jarred it to a stop, causing the whole thing to string-line. Why it derailed to being with is a bit of a mystery. Someone said that there may have been a wide gauge, but it would really have to be far out of gauge considering how wide the wheels are on those cars.
As for the cars being tipped over and the trucks being upright, that's normal. Railroad cars aren't physically secured to the trucks, they just set over the top of them and are held on by gravity.
I did see one person joking that, based on the narrow gauge and the rather wide body of the cars, perhaps the derailment was caused by too many overweight passengers on one side, followed by a joke that maybe they were doing a reenactment of the death of the Mount Gretna Narrow Gauge Railroad. The Mount Gretna Narrow Gauge Railroad in Pennsylvania was a 2-foot gauge railroad that served a National Guard rifle range and and in 1915 one of their trains overturned on a sharp curve when a large number of guardsmen attempted to board simultaneously from one side of the car. There were several severe injuries and the incident wiped out the MGNGRR's traffic, causing it to close within the year.
Shadeux said:NickD, your selection of vintage photographs are amazing and your writing explains the context so well. Wonderful! Do you have any insights on Southern and the "Magic City?" I went to Birmingham and back from N.O. in 1977? Everything was tired and faded, but the employees still gave their best. I loved it as a youngster.
By 1977, I believe that the only passenger service that Southern was still operating was the Southern Crescent, which was a consolidation of the Southerner and the Crescent.
Southern was one of three holdouts that did not join Amtrak on it's formation in 1971. Denver & Rio Grande Western had chose to not join because they wanted the scheduling flexibility on their mostly single-tracked mainline. Rock Island did the math and determined that it was actually cheaper to continue operating their two intercity passengers trains at a loss than pay in to join Amtrak. In the case of Southern, they had a few reasons for not dumping their intercity passenger service. One was that Amtrak, who was used to dealing with bankrupt Class Is, apparently came in making demands to the profitable and independent Southern and rubbed management the wrong way. Another was that Southern had concerns about degradation of service to their former customers. Also, like the D&RGW, Southern had concerns about scheduling flexibility and didn't want Amtrak independently scheduling passenger trains over their lines that disrupted their freight schedule. And finally, Southern had headquarters in both Washington DC and Birmingham and their management used the Southern Crescent to go back and forth between headquarters for free.
Southern passenger service lasted until 1979. By that point, profits had started to go downhill. The other issue was that Southern's pool of passenger equipment, the E-Units and FP7s and passenger cars, was being depleted by sheer attrition. Southern didn't want to go out and spend money on new passenger locomotives and passenger cars. The impending merger with Norfolk & Western also may have played a part in the cancellation of passenger services.
Birmingham was a major hub for the Southern (along with several other railroads, including Seaboard Air Line and Frisco) and many of their major passenger trains did stop in Birmingham.
One was the Southerner which offered service between the same terminuses of the more-famous Crescent (NYC-New Orleans) but at Atlanta it diverged from the Crescent's route to offer more inland service, including to Birmingham. The Crescent took a more direct route through Montgomery and Mobile. In 1970, as Southern downscaled passenger services, they merged the Southerner with the Crescent to form the Southern Crescent. The Southern Crescent actually used the slower, less-direct route through Birmingham, simply because the Crescent's route through Mobile required going over the Western Railway of Alabama, the Atlanta & West Point, and the Louisville & Nashville. By going through Birmingham, it stayed entirely on Southern trackage once south of Washington D.C., which made scheduling much more reliable. Amtrak picked up the route in 1979 and reverted it back to the original Crescent name, although it still follows the Southerner/Southern Crescent route.
Another was the Birmingham Special which went from New York City to Birmingham. Pennsylvania Railroad pulled it from Penn Station to Washington D.C., and then Southern took over from D.C. to Birmingham. It got really interesting when in 1932, the Southern rereouted the train around Atlanta and through Chattanooga and Bristol. It traveled over the Norfolk & Western from between Lynchburg, VA and Bristol, TN, resulting in the strange situation of using two unconnected sections of the Southern Railway: Washington–Lynchburg and Bristol–Birmingham. It was while riding this incarnation of the train that Mack Gordon and Henry Warren wrote the famed "Chattanooga Choo Choo". The song's lyrics, which don't explicitly mention the Birmingham Special directly by name, mention boarding the train on track 29 at Penn Station, which never had a track 29. Ironically, the premier train of the Pennsylvania Railroad's rival, the New York Central's 20th Century Limited, used track 29 at over at Grand Central Terminal. Also, when the song was recorded in 1941, the Birmingham Special used an electric, not steam, locomotive between New York and Washington. The time points mentioned reflect liberties for rhyme and actually suggest the pre-Bristol reroute, when it passed through North Carolina and didn't even serve Chattanooga.
The PRR bailed on the service north of Washington in 1956, and Southern discontinued sleeper service in 1964. Through service to Memphis ended on January 31, 1967. The Southern Railway dropped the Birmingham Special name on February 1, 1970, and later that year service to Birmingham itself came to an end, with the train terminating in Bristol, becoming the last train to service Chattanooga's Terminal Station. Although Southern stayed out of Amtrak, partner Norfolk & Western did join Amtrak, and Amtrak refused to operate the Lynchburg-Bristol section of the train. Southern operated the the unnamed train on the remaining Washington-Lynchburg segment until June 1, 1975, designating it #7 (southbound) and #8 (northbound).
After mentioning the Alco S-1 and S-2 belonging to Raven Rail, I figured I'd do a quick breakdown on the Alco S-series switchers. Before the S-series, Alco had offered the HH-series switchers, with HH standing for High Hood, necessary to fit the Mcintosh & Seymour 531 and 538-series engines. The HH-series switchers were fairly robust machines, but there were complaints of poor visibility in comparison to the EMD NW/SW-series and Baldwin VO-series switchers. So, Alco had Mcintosh & Seymour design a new engine that was based off the 538-series engine but with a redesigned frame and crankcase that lowered the engine down to allow a shorter hood.
Alco S-1: Produced between May 16th, 1940 and June, 29th, 1950, the Alco S-1 was the first of the new M&S 539-powered locomotives, replacing the HH660. It used a naturally aspirated version of the 539 that produced 660hp at 740rpm. It used Alco's own Blunt trucks, which were noted to be exceptional on rough tracks, perfect for a lot of yards and industrial applications, and the GE traction motors were capable of producing sustained max tractive effort as low as 6mph. Styling was by Alco designer Ray Patten, who gave it a mild Art Deco appearance that would be an early Alco trademark. Over 10 years, 543 Alco S-1s were produced, going to a mix of Class Is and industrial owners. New York Central and the New Haven were particularly fond of the S-1, buying 71 and 65 units respectively.
Alco S-2: Offered during the same timespan as the S-1, the Alco S-2 was the bigger brother, distinguishable by the longer grilles on the side of the hood and the larger stack. It used a turbocharged version of the M&S 539, called a 539T, that produced 1000hp and also rode on Alco's Blunt trucks. The S-2 was a smash hit, selling roughly triple the S-1, with 1502 S-2s built over 10 years. Again, New York Central went big on them, with 77, but was beat out by Southern Pacific, who purchased 76 for the SP and another 48 for their Texas & New Orleans subsidiary.
Alco S-3: In the late '40s, the Association of American Railroads released new standards on truck design, in a move to force some sort of standardization. Alco's Blunt trucks, while a good design, did not meet the new design standards. Alco launched the S-3, which was mechanically and cosmetically identical to the S-1 in all aspects other than using General Steel Castings AAR Type B trucks instead of the Blunt trucks. While the AAR Type B wasn't quite as good at handling subpar trackage, maintenance crews liked it a lot better. On a Blunt truck, removing a traction motor required lifting the locomotive off the trucks, whereas an AAR Type B, the traction motor could be dropped out using a pit. The S-3 had only a 3 year production run, but still sold 300 units total. Without any major definitive upgrades, most railroads really didn't come running to replace their S-1s with S-3s. CP had the largest order of S-3s, with 101 total, but New York Central again proved to be a big Alco switcher buyer, adding another 43 to their roster with the S-3.
Alco S-4: Just as the S-2 was the turbocharged companion to the S-1, the S-4 was the 1000hp companion to the S-3. Again, the only major difference between an S-2 and an S-4 was the trucks, and the visual difference between an S-3 and an S-4 was the bigger radiator and exhaust stack on the S-4. Also worth pointing out that despite the fact that the Alco 244 engine was in production and the 251 was on the way, Alco stuck to the old McIntosh & Seymour engine family, which traced it's ancestry back to 1931, in their switcher models. While the M&S engine design was heavy, maxed out at 1300hp, and was not happy with prolonged high-output operation like in the DL-109s, it was a tough, rugged engine that proved itself well in switcher applications. While not quite as popular as the S-2, the S-4 still moved almost 800 units, and again, the NYC bought them in bulk, with 43 for themselves and 35 for their Pittsburgh & Lake Erie subsidiary. The S-4 actually rolled out a little bit earlier than the S-3, debuting at the end of 1949, and ran 4 years longer until the end of production in 1957.
Alco S-5: Aware that their switcher lineup was getting out of date, Alco began developing a switcher to use the new 251 engine family in 1951. A prototype, called the DL420, was built using an 800hp inline-8 engine and RS-3 frames and truck. It never entered production, but then three years later, Alco introduced the S-5. It was mechanically similar to the DL420, with an 800hp inline-8 called the 251A, and AAR Type B trucks. Visually, it was a step away from the old original body, with the radiator now mounted on the nose of the hood, some of the rounded curves squared off, and the exhaust stack down on the other end of the hood. Alco built a demonstrator that was later sold to Island Creek Fuel & Transportation Company and then sold another 6 to Boston & Maine, and that was it. Likely the fact that Alco was offering an 800hp switcher when EMD was rolling out 1200hp and 1500hp models likely contributed to poor sales, as well as a general loss of faith in Alco.
Alco S-6: Debuting in May of 1955, the Alco S-6 was almost identical to an S-5, other than offering an additional 100hp. The B&M actually upgraded their S-5s to the same specs as the S-6 as well. While not as big of a sales bomb as the S-5, the S-6 was still pretty coolly received, only moving 126 units. Most noticeable is that very few Class Is, including faithful New York Central, purchased any of the S-6. Southern Pacific went in big, buying 70 of them, but the only other Class Is to buy an S-6 were Western Maryland and Northern Pacific, each of whom purchased exactly one unit. The S-6 did have a brief moment of pop culture relevancy when a pair of them destroyed the Delorean time machine at the end of Back To The Future III. Alco also tried diversifying the S-6, offering the SB-8/SSB-9, a cow-calf variant that Oliver Iron Mining Company purchased two of, and the T-6, which was a 1000hp, high-speed transfer variant that sold another 57 of. Alco S-6 production ended in 1960, while T-6 production ran until the end of Alco in 1969, with Newburgh & South Shore Railroad T-6s #1016 and #1017 actually being the final Alco diesels produced.
Only for the rich and famous, I'm sure; but WOW!
In reply to TheMagicRatchet :
Actually, I stand corrected. I've spent more for a night at Disney World. I suppose the transportation would be interesting.
Taken from the Bring A Welder Facebook page "The Davis Motor Mine Cart - Found in an abandoned Gold Mine in Northern California in the late 1970s, the Davis Motor Mine Cart is a home built creation using most of a 1926 Harley-Davidson 21c.i. B-Model motorcycle. The machine also features a Ford Model-A transmission, and electric start!" I like the electric cooling fan too.
Mcintosh & Seymour 539T-powered locomotives in Amtrak Phase III livery? Yep, it happened. After Amtrak's formation and the 1981 absorption of former PRR subsidiary Washington Terminal Company, they ended up with five Alco RS-1s on the roster. Amtrak #47 was one of three of Washington Terminal RS1’s that received Amtrak’s Phase III paint scheme. The other machine behind it, S-2 #746, is even rarer, as it was the sole Alco S-2 on Amtrak's roster. It came from the US Army as #7110 and was originally Amtrak #7110 in Phase I livery, but then was renumbered to #746 (Amtrak assigned it's switchers to the 700-series) and repainted to Phase III livery.
I was glad to hear that Illinois Railway Museum has grabbed an EMD SD50 for their collection. It's an ex-C&NW unit that ended up in leasing service under NRE and is currently stored at Silvis, still in C&NW colors with NREX reporting marks patched on. It's even still wearing the same number that it wore when it belonged to C&NW. I'm 99.9% certain that this is the first SD50 to be slated for preservation. There was a B&O SD50, the last diesel bought by B&O, that was supposed to go to the B&O Railroad Museum but someone at CSX dropped the ball and it got sold off to Larry's Truck & Electrical instead. I really worry about some of these 3rd-generation diesels slipping into extinction while no one is paying attention. It's already happened with quite a few GE Dash-7 and Dash-8 variants and the EMD SD80MAC "Conrail Cadillacs", and there were Bombardier/MLW HR616s sitting at Silvis for years that no one attempted to save before they were scrapped. I'm hoping either IRM or Monticello Railway Museum is able to secure an Illinois Central "Death Star" SD70 before they either get scrapped or run through a rebuilding process that obliterates any and all traces of their identity.
On the subject of diesel preservation, I was surprised to recently learn that GE #752 survived until almost into the year 2000. What was GE #752? It was one of two General Electric XP-24 prototypes, which were an outgrowth of the UD18Bs that GE had built for Nacionales de Mexico and served as the testbed for the GE U25B. There was a definite physical resemblance between the XP-24 and the early high-hood U25B demonstrators.
There are some cosmetic differences though from an early U25B. The big one is that, rather than having a walkway around the front and a ladder up there, the front hood extended all the way to the end of the frame and had a pass-through door. The "front" ladder was also just behind the cab. There were some other minor differences too, like the design and positioning of the radiators, a unique front pilot, and the number of doors on the long hood.
These photos show the XP-24 pair, #751 and #752, testing on the Illinois Central with the Illinois Central's dynamometer car. Apparently, whatever the IC saw with the XP-24s didn't convince them that they needed any, since Illinois Central never purchased any U25Bs, or any other GE models for that matter.
After testing, the XP-24s were taken back to Erie by GE and put out in the back lot. GE sold off the U25B demonstrators, but they didn't sell the XP-24s. The #751 was scrapped at some unknown point, but the #752 reportedly sat at the factory for decades. There was also one of the high-nose GE U25B demonstrators back there that must have been traded back in at some point. For whatever reason, after years of holding onto those, GE ended up scrapping them just short of the next millennium without any attempt to preserve them. A pity considering that the XP-24 was the wind-up to GE entering the domestic locomotive market and the U25B demonstrators were what proved that GE had it to enter the road switcher market. At least one person claims that GE was planning to donate the pair but there was a mixup that resulted in them being cut up (not an unprecedented story).
Some rare color photos of the #751 and #752 out testing.
And the #752 sitting at Erie in later years. That sure looks like an early Alco S-series switcher to the right of it as well.
What really prompted the construction of the XP-24 and the introduction of the U25B, the final nail in the Alco-GE partnership coffin, was an incident known as the Pony Truck Affair. In the late 1950s, South African Railways, at the time one of the last bastions of steam traction, planned to embark on a massive dieselization program. A SAR technical team was sent to Europe the United States to prepare an assessment of design alternatives, finalize specifications and compile a list of qualified bidders.
In the US, the only companies considered qualified bidders were EMD, Alco, and GE (GE had only produced switchers domestically, but had built a number of export road locomotives, often using Alco engines). SAR expressed disdain for supercharged two-stroke prime movers, like what EMD used, and had a strong preference for Alco's turbocharged 4-stroke 251 series prime mover. SAR also expressed a preference for GE's electrical systems over EMD's electrical gear. Furthermore, as a long-time prior supplier of steam locomotives for the SAR, Alco appeared to be virtually guaranteed of receiving the order. GE, as Alco's partner, wanted Alco to get that contract since it would be sales of GE electrical components as well.
SAR ultimately settled on two different order specs: 115 units of 1,800 horsepower with a 1+C-C+1 wheel arrangement; or 230 units of 1,000 horsepower locomotives with a C-C wheel arrangement. These units were intended for operation in South West Africa, which had very light rail conditions that necessitated lighter axle loadings which could not be achieved with conventional C bogies under a heavy locomotive. General Steel Castings had a design on paper for a 1+C truck, a powered 3-axle truck with an integral unpowered articulared single axle "pony truck", which could be utilized by either Alco or GE and which would enable the SAR's specifications to be met for the heavier 1,800 horsepower units. The SAR made it clear that, despite the two options afforded by the tender for bids, its strong preference was for the more powerful 1+C-C+1 locomotive.
When it came time to place bids, Alco refused to bid on the 1+C-C+1 design, risking losing the contract to EMD. Alco's official reasoning for refusing to bid on the pony truck design was that General Steel Casting's design was not universally accepted by Alco's engineering management. GE perceived it as Alco being shortsighted and trying to cram the bigger order of the less preferred design down SAR's throat and risk losing future sales. GE had their own turbocharged 4-cycle engine, the Cooper-Bessemer FDL that they were using in some of their switcher models and their export models, and they were the preferred electrical component supplier already, and they had no reservations about the GSC truck design. GE bid on both options and won, building the pony trucked SAR Class 32-000 and opening the floodgates of GE sales to South Africa. Between 1959 and 1981, over half the diesel locomotives on SAR's sizable roster were constructed by GE and it was years before EMD even managed to make a sale to SAR.
The Class 32-000 caused the final split between Alco-GE. GE saw that their partner just didn't have what it took anymore, between their short-sightedness in the SAR bid and abandoning their commanding lead of the switcher market by failing to respond to EMD's 1200hp and 1500hp models. GE also gained the confidence that they could operate as an independent builder. There are some who claim that prior to the Class 32-000 sale, GE had actually been considering exiting the railroad industry altogether, similar to how Westinghouse had pulled out of the market in 1956 and taken Baldwin with it, due to Alco's diminishing relevance in the market.
There was also bad blood over on the Alco side of things. Alco saw GE outbidding them on the SAR sale as a clear betrayal. Also, some of Alco's stained reputation had come directly from GE components. The early 244 engines had had a number of turbocharger failures, and the air-cooled constant-flow turbochargers had been supplied by GE. UP had made an announcement that they would be purchasing more EMD passenger diesels, and when Alco wrote to UP about why they also weren't purchasing more Alco passenger diesels, UP singled out the turbocharger failures as the reason that they would not be purchasing any further Alco passenger diesels. That poor reputation of the Alco 244, for which GE was partly to blame, really sank Alco's chances in the market and it was a dark cloud that hung over their head until the end. Missouri Pacific, for example, had issues with their RS-3s and PA-1s, and never forgave Alco, refusing to order any more Alco products even after the 251 engine came out. And while the GE traction motors and generators on the early products were quite robust, there was still issues with the early GE systems, particularly on the PA. For example, when ATSF and SP launched a major rebuilding of their Alco PAs to try and get the reliability up to par, their efforts were focused on the electrical system and they ended up replacing most, if not all, of the electrical cabinet.
In the end, the two went their separate ways. GE continued to supply electrical parts to Alco, although no longer giving them a discount and allegedly not selling them the top components, while entering the market themselves. Alco completely revamped their lineup with the Century series and saw a small uptick in sales, but was undone by reliability woes on the 3000hp and 3600hp models, as well as poor customer service. GE entered with the Universal series, which were noted to not actually be inherently better machines than the Alco Century series, but had much better financing and product support.
In terms of preservation, GE actually has done quite a bit though, arguably more than EMD.
For starters, there would be no Baldwin RF-16s left if it wasn't for GE. In 1966, New York Central traded in their last remaining Baldwin sharknoses on GE U28Bs and U30Bs. Shortly afterwards, the Monongahela Railway, which operated a large amount of Baldwin S-12 switchers, approached GE about purchasing some of the RF-16s. Unlike EMD, who scrapped nearly every single trade-in unit they received, GE was more conducive to reselling trade-ins, and so they sold 9 of the RF-16s, 6 operational and 3 parts units, to the Monogahela Railway for the sum of $6000 each. The Monongahela would run them for the next 8 years, with all but 2 eventually being run into the ground, at which point the Delaware & Hudson, under Bruce Sterzing's colorful presidency, would purchase them and fix them up nicely. and run them for several years. These days, the #1205 and #1216 sit, out of service, tucked away inside the shops at the Escanaba & Lake Superior to be donated to a museum on their owner's death. But, because GE was willing to resell them, they still exist to be restored someday.
GE is also responsible for the fact that there are still 4 existing Alco PAs. D&H had purchased 4 Alco PA-1s from AT&SF in 1967 and placed them in service on their revamped Laurentian and ran them in that service until Amtrak's formation in 1971 put an end to the Laurentian. With some of the unmodified, unrebuilt PA-1s having fallen out of service, and no forseeable passenger service for them to run, the D&H actually traded them in to GE on some big U33Cs. But then, the D&H convinced Amtrak to revive the Laurentian service as the Adirondack and, since Amtrak was too unstable on formation, the D&H was going to operate the service. The D&H needed motive power, and so they managed to buy the four PA-1s back from GE, who had amazingly kept the units in storage for over 3 years. Its amazing that GE sat on the 4 PA-1s for 3 years and didn't scrap them, and because they didn't there are now four PAs still in existence in various states.
GE took in ex-NYC GE U25B #2500, the first NYC U25B, in on trade from Conrail in 1983. The #2500 was then stashed away in the back lot at the Erie plant for a decade. In 1993, GE cleaned the #2500 up, repainted it into New York Central colors and lettering, and then donated it to the Lake Shore Railroad Museum.
Just this year, GE donated GECX #6002, one of the AC6000W demonstrators, to the Lake Shore Railway Museum (quite the spot to see GEs through the years, they have several small GE switchers, a GE electric lomotive, a U25B, a B30-7, a B32-8 and now the AC6000W). The #6002 was built in 1998 and after a tour, it returned to Erie, where it was used for testing and leasing over the years. There aren't many of the big 6000hp AC GEs left in as-built condition (a lot were derated to 4400hp) and this is the only GE AC-traction locomotive in preservation so far.
GE also ended up saving two big ex-BCRail M630s as part of the short-lived Super-7 rebuild program. In the late 1980s, GE came up with the idea of a rebuild program where railroads could send in their old U-Boats or Dash-7s and GE would freshen up the mechanical components and then rewire them with Dash-8 electrical systems. The program rebuilt quite some U23Bs into B32-S7s and U30Cs into C30-S7s but wasn't a huge success. But, where it really got interesting, was that GE decided to offer the same program on non-GE locomotives, primarily Alco/MLWs since they used GE electrical systems, and to demonstrate, they purchased the majority of the MLW M630s that BCRail was retiring. One of the M630s was rebuilt into an M630-S7, the rebuild actually performed in the MLW factory that GE had purchased, and sent it on a test run down to Mexico, since there were still plenty of big Alco/MLWs running down there. They found no buyers for the offbrand program, but they sure sold a lot of C30-S7s down there. The M630-S7 returned to Erie and did a quick stint in their leasing service (it was apparently sent west to BNSF at one point, who took one look at it when it arrived, realized it was an Alco and sent it right back to PA) and then was put into service with one of the unrebuilt M630s for load-testing new units (the rest were all scrapped). Finally, about 5 years ago, GE sold the M630-S7 and the unrebuilt M630 to Delaware-Lackawanna, where the weird hybrid M630-S7 can still be seen running around in GE fleet colors.
Well.....that's embarrassing.
Strasburg had a big Oops! this morning with their first train of the day. Someone moved an excavator and some MoW equipment up to the siding at Leaman Place and forgot to reset the switch. While making the runaround with #475, the crew was a bit too preoccupied with waving to the passengers, didn't notice that the flag indicators on the siding were not green, and ran the #475 into the excavator and knocked a hole in the smokebox. Complacency kills people and it kills careers. Fortunately it didn't punch a hole in the front flue sheet or it really would have gotten exciting. I'm saying shared-fault here: whoever put the excavator in the siding should have reset the siding, but if the engineer had been looking ahead and noticed the indicator on the switch stand there wouldn't have been an incident.
Seems like a sadly easily avoidable incident. Reduced speed and looking ahead at the points and the switch indicator seemed to have been largely ignored. I don't think this will go favorably for the crew.
Ouch! Do they have something else there in service besides 611?
TheMagicRatchet said:Ouch! Do they have something else there in service besides 611?
They have 2-10-0 #90 and 2-6-0 #89 in service as well. I know they don't run #89 much, just because she's too a little too light for the length of trains they run, but she could run the weekday runs when there's less ridership.
The good news is, no one was injured, it doesn't appear like they broke the front flue sheet (that would have gotten real exciting), Strasburg has the funds and know-how to fix it, and it wasn't #611. Its bad enough to damage your own equipment but when you smack up equipment you don't own....
Its been a thrilling week down in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. On top of the accident at Strasburg today, last weekend the Reading & Northern had a firetruck dodge the gates at Tamaqua while #2102 was approaching at speed. Also, I had tickets to ride the Colebrookdale Railroad this Friday during my trip to Pennsylvania. Then today I received a phone call from the railroad telling me that they had a dump truck clip their bridge and they can't run trains until an inspector gets there to clear it for operation. Unfortunately, the inspector can't get there until next week, so they had to refund my ticket. I guess I'll have to visit the Secret Valley Line another time.
Since my trip on the Colebrookdale Railroad was dashed by that dump truck strike, I may try to chase Reading & Northern's NRFF. Reading & Northern has a system of train acronyms, like QAJT (Tamaqua-Jim Thorpe) or PIME (Pittston-Mehoopany) or YJNR (Yard Job North Reading). NRFF is the North Reading Fast Freight, and it's kind of their premier freight train, running from North Reading all the way to Pittston, often with 50+ car train lengths and 4 or 5 SD50s and SD40-2s on the front (sometimes there is even stuff like SW8s or MP15s in the mix). I've never caught much of the R&N freight moves before, and the call time is 1:30pm, which gives me time to drive down tomorrow morning)
It'd be great to catch one of the rebuilt GP30s that they have (ATSF called them a GP39R, and then R&N nicknamed them a GP39RN) but I don't believe they run them on the NRFF. At least not normally, maybe in a pinch when there's no other power available.
Well, they weren't on the NRFF but I did get my GP30s. I was eating lunch in Tamaqua when #2531 and #2535 came in with JTQA. Only way it would have been better would have been if #2535 was leading, since it's painted in a unique maroon and yellow livery. These are ex-ATSF rebuilds, which ATSF called a GP39R. ATSF sent all their GP30s and GP35s through the program, giving them 645 power packs and rating them at a uniform 2500hp and replacing the horrendous original electrical systems with Dash-2 systems. Regardless of the base donor, they were called a GP39R, and the only difference was the body shell.
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