Takes more'n a snowball to stop U.S. Trains

[Anonymous]

Avalanches hit freight train in Mont.
(The Associated Press circulated the following article on January 28.)

ESSEX, Mont. -- Avalanches crashed into a freight train in northwest Montana on Wednesday, knocking 15 cars off the rails and shutting down the tracks also used by Amtrak.

No one was injured and the derailed grain cars were empty, said Gus Melonas, a Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railway spokesman.

``The slides occurred due to extremely heavy snowfall,'' he said. ``We've had 60 inches of snow in the area.''

The first avalanche knocked seven cars off the track near the southern edge of Glacier National Park, Melonas said. Another slide about 15 minutes later knocked eight more cars off the track.

The 119-car train was en route from Pasco, Wash., to Great Falls.

Amtrak's Empire Builder passenger train, which uses the same tracks on its route between Chicago and Seattle, was suspended Wednesday afternoon because of the avalanche danger, Melonas said.

Passenger service is stopped at least until Friday, he said, though freight trains could resume Thursday.


Thursday, January 29, 2004

[Anonymous]

Interasting The BUILDER IS OPERATING BETWEEN CHICAGO AND MINNEAPOLIS- ST. PAUL AS TRAINS 807 and 808 and alentive transpertation is not avaible experct between SPOKANE-SEATTLE-PORTLAND

[kenneo]

"In the 'old days"", there were three trains each way 24/7/365 on the GN, NP and MILW. GN would have re-routed its three trains around the area - stopping them at the Twin Cities would have meant an embargo on passenger service over the entire railroad. That would not have happened.

AMTRAK has the equipment, crews and proper schedules to operate Spokane-Portland and Spokane-Seattle trains, but puts people on busses. AMTRAK is not providing humanitarian services through North Dakota and eastern Montana. Not even UP would have begged off from that. When UP operated the yellow fleet along the Columbia River, many (several times each winter!) were the times that I-84 would be closed between Hood River and Troutdale and each passenger train would stop whever needed to pick up people (included stranded freeway travelers), off-load supplies going each direction. Trains would lose time doing this, but it was the railroads attitude, then, that this should be done. I can remember seeing the City, the Rose and the Idaho Mail arrive at Portland so covered with ice you could hardly see the train.

The SPS did the same with its Empire Builder/North Coast Limited and Western Star/Mainstreeter connections did the same on the Washington side between Camas and Bingen. They, too, would come into Portland a few hundred tons over gross due to ice.

My whole point, what about all those folks along the Empire Builders route in Minnisoota, North Dakota and Montana, with all the snow and ice and deepfreea temperatures?

So the train runs late. This is, of course, a rare thing on the BNSF, but not for AMTRAK in general. One of the true strengths of a railroad is that it can go when nothing else can. Somebody is sure going to make that a much harder sell now.

What has happened to the railroaders who wouldn't stop until their train was taken out by a snow slide or put in the ditch or the track was utterly not passable?

I will now get off my [soapbox] and put a sock in it.

[PNWRMNM]

Eric,

They are up on the side of that mountain in Montana tonight.

Mac

[Anonymous]

No sleet, nor Storm, nor Hail , nor Avalance can stop a Train!

[BaltACD]

Just about anything weather can stop the American train. There isn't sufficient manpower to take care of switches and signals to keep operations fluid. A little snow, a little rain even a little heat bring operations to a snarling mess.

[rrnut282]

When most of corporate America figured out that you had to stop cutting jobs when operations were affected, railroads cut themselves into disfunctionalism and thought that worked so well they cut some more. This is what short-sighted (focused only on the next quarterly report in the Wall Street Journal) management styles create: a once great industry reduced to a transportation step-child.

[kenneo]

Folks, I did not make myself clear. I am talking about ATTITUDE. Not doing something stupid. For example, when it floods in Tillamook and US101 is closed, the POTB gets out the RDC and runs the wheels off it between Garabaldi and the Air Base until the highway reopens. People still get to work and all that this means.

I don't mean to imply that the BN is not trying to clean up the mess as fast as they can. Snow slides and mud slides are the two most dangerous things MudChicken and Company have to deal with from the natural environment. These things are real widow makers and must be handled with great care.

Nor do I mean to imply that moving a train across Minnesoota, North Dakota and eastern Montana in this kind of weather is easy. It is anything but that. And that is precisely the reason AMTRAK should be out there assisting the communities it operates through.

It is about giving back to the community you serve. It is about showing concern about that community and assisting them when they are in need. It is about the "Golden Rule".

So, back to my question. What has happened to those men who knew how to railroad?

[Anonymous]

I don't usually cut the RR's a lot of slack in regards to poor service, but this one is an act of God to the n-th degree. The derailment / avalanche happened at 1 PM Wed. and the line was re-opened by 10 PM Thurs. Not bad cycle time considering they had to get avalanche experts in to give an all-clear first, then had to work in an environmentally restricted / sensitive manner given the proximity to Glacier Park and all the while, it was in some really lousy, cold weather. For once I'd say 3 Cheers to the BNSF.