howdy
Ns had a UP lead west frieght and no cars uptown when I left work.Went into Defiance and CSX's y101 local was having a problem with a switch at omni.It is in the plant at FC(Defiance) so it help up other trains too. Csx mow was on it's way to fix a slow order.When we left town we saw the ND&W dropping off cars for csx and the Y101 finally got to go back to the yard.Now at home getting ready to get cleaned up.
stay safe
Joe
Deshler Ohio-crossroads of the B&O Matt eats your fries.YUM! Clinton st viaduct undefeated against too tall trucks!!!(voted to be called the "Clinton St. can opener").
Just back from a major blaze in a small resort community in the Thousand Islands. Nine departments (basically three alarms) were unable to save the building. In fact, it was a goner by the time of dispatch by the sounds of it.
It was a building with many small businesses, including the post office, a children's clothing store, an ice cream shop, and also served as one of the Island's fire department stations. All of the apparatus was lost, but the mail was rescued.
Investigators are still looking for the cause, and additional fire departments have been called in to perform overhaul (putting out the hot spots).
I'm pooped.
Larry Resident Microferroequinologist (at least at my house) Everyone goes home; Safety begins with you My Opinion. Standard Disclaimers Apply. No Expiration Date Come ride the rails with me! There's one thing about humility - the moment you think you've got it, you've lost it...
ns had 2 trains waiting to go west when I left work.worked around the house today.Getting ready for the corn city fest this weekend.
Randy Vos
"Ever have one of those days where you couldn't hit the ground with your hat??" - Waylon Jennings
"May the Lord take a liking to you and blow you up, real good" - SCTV
rvos1979Larry, how far away from your area was that Amish kidnapping story? Trying to get my bearings on it.....
About 30-40 miles north of me - just south of Ogdensburg. The girls were left at a house near Richville, from which they fled and found someone who took them safely home. The kidnappers are still at large.
Still recovering from the overnight at the fire. Got some sleep this AM, and headed back to bed here shortly, as I'm on the railroad tomorrow.
Staggered-in from NooYawk and Zinzinnati only to zoom off to Glenwood on the other side of the state.
Tunnels & reunions & salvaged data - I'm zonked. Managed to avoid the big net over Lincoln once more, but the raindrops followed me everywhere.
Astoundingly adventuresome day this was!
Not everything went as well as planned, but will you catch me complaining? No way! I went to a remote spot in Gary that I've often thought about utilizing, and just watched the trains roll by (or not...more on that later). I first went out to Michigan City (catching a NS freight in Chesterton on the way), but there were no secondhand coal cars for me to check out.
To Gary. My spot was pretty much as I thought it would be, position-wise. A great view of two overpasses: the Norfolk Southern's ex-New York Central "Water Level Route" to my right, and CSX's former Baltimore & Ohio main line to my left. I was closer to CSX in my spot, but could read car numbers and reporting marks on either line. Beyond the CSX underpass by several hundred feet was a grade crossing for the Chicago SouthShore & South Bend, which hosts passenger trains of the Northern Indiana Commuter Transportation District. These, too, were also visible from my location.
I parked in my spot at 1050. There was a stack train on the NS overpass, not moving. Not a problem--things got busy in a hurry.
1052: An Amtrak train from Michigan, making his track speed (79), passed next to the stopped stacker.
1059: A SouthShore freight passes westbound. I didn't have to run out and look, because I'd seen the train on the way in, and made notes of all of the goodies on it.
1103: The stack train on the NS moved out, westbound.
1115: An eastbound CSX manifest freight.
1121: A westbound CSX manifest freight.
1135: An eastbound CSX freight on NS tracks. The trains that run this way head up to Michigan, leaving the NS main line at Porter, Indiana.
1138: A westbound CSX train of crude-oil tank cars.
1142: A westbound NS train of empty INLX flat cars for slab steel.
1144: A westbound NICTD passenger train.
1208: A westbound NS train of crude-oil tank cars.
Lunch break: While waiting for my order (which I took to go, naturally!), I saw a westbound NS stack train at 1220. Delivered the wedding card from Pat and me to the daughter of the owner; received a hug big enough for two, and the promise of a bowl of lemon rice soup to take home to Pat (they know it's her favorite from there!).
1232: A westbound NS manifest freight.
1239: An eastbound train of ethanol tank cars, headed by Canadian Pacific owned and leased power.
1246: A westbound NS train of auto rack cars.
1301: A westbound CSX manifest freight.
1318: A westbound CSX train of crude-oil tank cars, lead by BNSF Railway locomotives.
1320: Amtrak's westbound Lakeshore Limited (or should I say "Lateshore"?), moving very fast on NS line.
1332: A westbound CSX stack train--two units, very, very long, and it stopped.
1338: A westbound NICTD passenger train.
1340: An eastbound NICTD passenger train. Nice work--it's single track there, and for quite a distance west.
1408: Gave up, since it was the biggest quiet period of the entire trip. Went back to the restaurant, got soup for Pat (no charge!), a muffin for me (no charge!), and left, catching an eastbound NS manifest at 1415.
That's 21 trains in about 3 1/2 hours, or one train every ten minutes. Not bad. I got most of a letter handwritten in the time between trains, and was able to listen to some Tschaikovsky and Mahler symphonies on the radio while doing all of this. It's a great spot...I was not kicked out of it, though some people gave me some strange looks as they drove past.
Headed home, through Gary, I noticed that the CSX stack train had begun to move east, passing the last CSX manifest (from 1301 at my spot), which was stopped on the other track. I passed the Gary Airport, where I saw the Blue Angels in flight (very low!) and a stunt plane leaving a smoke trail. As I drove from Route 12 to 312 west of Gary, I was blocked...by the CSX stack train. That's how I know just how long he was...while he was plodding by, an eastbound stack train came and went.
Through East Chicago and Hammond, with the stack train keeping pace with me. Of course, the highway crosses the tracks near the state line, so I had to wait for it again. Alongside the South Shore yard in Burnham, then blocked by a Norfolk Southern manifest on the former Nickel Plate main line. Too far away to get much information off it.
From Burnham to Dolton, where CSX blocked me with an eastbound coal train...very colorful, with red, blue, yellow, and orange rotary-coupler ends on various cars.
Then to Blue Island crossing, where an Iowa Interstate freight had things blocked for me and a bunch of other drivers. It stayed put for pretty much an hour. I knew some back roads, so I could get in a good position to see some of the other trains that went through...several Metra scoots on the old Rock Island, and three stack trains on CSX--two westbound and one eastbound, The second westbound was my old friend from Gary, East Chicago, Hammond, etcetera, etcetera...I decided it was time to go home. I had to go out via downtown Blue Island, and by the time I got to the tracks again, the IAIS freight was on the roll, but too slowly for me to contrive to get blocked by it.
Home in time for dinner. Pat had missed me, in spite of the fact that I left the laptop home with her. I hope to do this again sometime!
Carl
Railroader Emeritus (practiced railroading for 46 years--and in 2010 I finally got it right!)
CAACSCOCOM--I don't want to behave improperly, so I just won't behave at all. (SM)
tree68 Just back from a major blaze in a small resort community in the Thousand Islands. Nine departments (basically three alarms) were unable to save the building. In fact, it was a goner by the time of dispatch by the sounds of it. It was a building with many small businesses, including the post office, a children's clothing store, an ice cream shop, and also served as one of the Island's fire department stations. All of the apparatus was lost, but the mail was rescued. Investigators are still looking for the cause, and additional fire departments have been called in to perform overhaul (putting out the hot spots). I'm pooped.
Thanks to Chris / CopCarSS for my avatar.
Murphy Siding Larry- Can you explain "three alarm fire"? I always hear about big fires being 3 alarm, or 4 alarm fires, but never understood what it meant.
Certainly!
Fire departments in many, if not most, areas (especially cities and other built-up areas) have a standard "response" that is dispatched to structure fires. In general, it's enough personnel and apparatus to deal with a basic "room and contents" fire - nowadays, that's going to be about 15 firefighters, two or three engines (pumpers), a ladder truck or two, and maybe a rescue truck (toolbox on wheels), along with a command officer. That's the "first alarm."
Each location in a given response district (or for each pull box, for those areas having fire boxes) will have a "run card." The card details what fire companies to send. Today that will be a computerized function, but is still oftimes called a run card.
Should responding personnel find that they don't have enough resources to deal with the incident at hand, they will simply advise the dispatcher to "send a second alarm." This is also spelled out on the run card for the location in question. This will bring more apparatus and firefighters (maybe two engines and a ladder truck, maybe more) and may initiate calls to higher-ranking personnel.
The same will happen if it's found that even with the additional resources, it's still not enough.
Hence, a "third," "fourth," etc alarm. Big cities may have upwards of nine alarms specified on the run card. Such an action will also result in other companies (engines, ladders) being moved from their own station to another to provide coverage in the event of another incident.
Some areas also use "special calls." This is when the incident commander decides, f'rinstance, that he/she needs more ladder trucks, but not the engines that would come along if a full extra alarm was requested.
The incident commander at the fire I attended didn't actully call for three alarms (I don't know if that department has run cards for their district), but did call for two additional "waves" of help, hence my description of a three alarm blaze. We were on the third alarm, and helped move water from the St Lawrence River to the fire scene via some 800 feet of 5" hose, in addition to providing "hands on" firefighting.
Of course, we all know that a one "L" lama is a Tibetan priest, and a two "L" llama is a pack animal. But a three "L" -lama is a heck of a big blaze. (It sounds funnier when you say it out loud.)
Larry- Thanks for the explanation.Blue Streak 1:I'm not a fireman, and I didn't stay in a Holiday Inn last night...... I suspect that the buildings predate the requirement of having sprinklers, or are in a rural area where they are non mandated. In my neck of the woods, we have a city of about 165,000 people surrounded by cornfields and small towns. My office is in a small town about 4 miles away from the city. Each small town has a volunteer fire department that is unmanned. Fire calls go into 911 who then connects with the local firemen by fire pagers. We have 2 men on our yard crew that are firemen. There are times they have to speed out the door to an emergency , with others who work in the town. All the local volunteer fire departments help each other, and Sioux Falls helps out when an incident is too big to handle.
Can someone please enlighten me? I've been reading these fora for four or five years and have been puzzled from the beginning by the phrase "...and I didn't stay in a Holiday Inn..." Where did this come from and what is the implication?
_____________
"A stranger's just a friend you ain't met yet." --- Dave Gardner
Paul of Covington Can someone please enlighten me? I've been reading these fora for four or five years and have been puzzled from the beginning by the phrase "...and I didn't stay in a Holiday Inn..." Where did this come from and what is the implication?
^
She who has no signature! cinscocom-tmw
afternoon
cameras are charging.truck is partially loaded.Matt and Mamma are back to school shopping.chores to do here for me.
blue streak 1Larry: Something this poster cannot understand. These stations are unmanned ? Why aren't sprinklers installed ? Realize that finances are a problem but -------------- ?
Murphy sums it up pretty well.
There are 46 fire departments in my county (some have become redundant, but that's another discussion entirely). Two are full time staffed - the county seat and a military installation. Another has a paid driver 24/7 and is otherwise staffed entirely by volunteers. A couple of others have one daytime staffer, and are also otherwise staffed by volunteers. Everyone else is fully volunteer, and then it's a "best effort."
Back in the day, farmers and shift workers at the many mills and factories were available during the day. That's not so much the case any more, leading to daytime manpower shortages - a regular thing. Sometimes that manifests itself at night, too. After all, many folks don't get paid if they don't show up for work...
As Murph points out, we do help each other out. A structure fire dispatch in our district will have ourselves and three others departments called out, plus the local ambulance. The fire I started this all with ended up with at least nine departments on scene, and another four or more moved to other stations to provide coverage. Later that morning several other departments were called in to relieve the original crews.
We are notified via pager, a siren on the fire house (some actually use old air raid sirens), and via text messages.
In the end, it does come down to money. F'rinstance, my fire district, via an 85 cent per thousand dollars of valuation, raises about $400,000 in taxes each year. That goes to pay for the heat, lights, insurance, apparatus, other equipment, and a reserve account we use to make major purchases (like new fire trucks). We cover something over 75 square miles, and a portion of the Thousand Islands (and thus St Lawrence River).
The cost to staff one engine company (4 firefighters) is north of a half million dollars per year - and that's just the pay and benefits for the personnel. So to staff one engine 24/7 for our fire district would better than double the money needed to support fire protection.
It's possible we could afford to do that (legal restrictions on raising taxes notwithstanding), but it would cause a substantial increase in property taxes - and that might not bode well for the hundreds of seasonal residents. But for a small department in a very small town, that kind of money would be impossible to raise through taxes.
As for sprinklers - we love them! But most of the stations around here predate any form of sprinkler requirements (our current station was built in 1957 - there are many older), and there is also the issue of water supply - only stations located in areas with municipal water can easily install them. Otherwise it comes down to underground tanks and pump systems in order to support the necessary flows for the required duration. We're planning a new station, and it would take such an installation to support sprinklers in the station.
One other thought - in some areas the fire department operates in the same fashion as a purely volunteer department - pagers, respond from home - but the firefighters are paid when they respond. That's generally referred to as "paid on call."
Close (emphasis added - PDN): "The original campaign, which featured commercials ending in the line "But I did stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night," ran for 11 years, starting in 1998, and was originally created by Fallon."
For more on this catch phrase, see:
http://www.adweek.com/news/advertising-branding/ad-day-holiday-inn-express-148485
- Paul North.
Our yard guys get a payment from the FD when they go on a call, they get some kind of payment to offset lost time at work. When I was a kid in Alaska, in the 60's, we lived 23 miles outside of Anchorage, the big city. My sister's husband had picked me up at school, and there was a house fire just up the road. He stopped to see if he could help, and found that the whole fire crew was housewives, and the highway was full of station wagons full of school kids.
Murphy Siding Our yard guys get a payment from the FD when they go on a call, they get some kind of payment to offset lost time at work. When I was a kid in Alaska, in the 60's, we lived 23 miles outside of Anchorage, the big city. My sister's husband had picked me up at school, and there was a house fire just up the road. He stopped to see if he could help, and found that the whole fire crew was housewives, and the highway was full of station wagons full of school kids.
Mookie Murphy Siding Our yard guys get a payment from the FD when they go on a call, they get some kind of payment to offset lost time at work. When I was a kid in Alaska, in the 60's, we lived 23 miles outside of Anchorage, the big city. My sister's husband had picked me up at school, and there was a house fire just up the road. He stopped to see if he could help, and found that the whole fire crew was housewives, and the highway was full of station wagons full of school kids. Yessss!
Thanks, Murphy & Paul, about the Holiday Inn Express meaning. I had a rough idea about the implication, but I don't remember the ads at all. I think maybe I've learned to turn my mind off during commercials.
Murphy Siding Mookie Murphy Siding Our yard guys get a payment from the FD when they go on a call, they get some kind of payment to offset lost time at work. When I was a kid in Alaska, in the 60's, we lived 23 miles outside of Anchorage, the big city. My sister's husband had picked me up at school, and there was a house fire just up the road. He stopped to see if he could help, and found that the whole fire crew was housewives, and the highway was full of station wagons full of school kids. Yessss! Were you a volunteer fire.....person?
MookieNooooo....
Some years ago one of the fire departments in the area "recruited" their Ladies Auxiliary as drivers. That was in the day when there were still many stay-at-home moms.
When the alarm came in, the ladies would go to the station and get the trucks while the firemen went straight to the fire. I don't recall how long that lasted.
At the big fire the other day, we were trying to figure out what departments still had an auxiliary we could call on to bring any sort of refreshments. There aren't many left.
Johnny
DeggestyI used to be able to look down the valley when sitting here in the living room area, but the trees keep growing!
That's something we regularly explain to our passengers - a century ago much of the territory we run through in the Adirondacks was bare hillsides. The vistas from some points had to be spectacular. Just 50 years ago, one section of our line had no trees between the tracks and the river (NYC kept it cleared out) - it is well grown up now.
When I was growing up, the fire department equipment consisted of a hose cart; I do not know if there any motive force beyond Armstrong force.
If you look at many old pieces - especially hand pumpers and hose carts, you will see a rope coiled up between the front wheels (or the spool where the rope went). That rope was unrolled and used by the men pulling the apparatus. Usually a couple of men directed the front wheels via a tongue, but the fellows on the rope did the bulk of the work.
In hilly areas, there might be a similar rope arrangement on the rear of the rig, so more men could keep it from running away downhill!
While bigger towns could afford to keep horses on hand to draw their apparatus, small towns would have to rely on the availability of suitable animals. The men were probably more readily available.
Eventually size overtook the ability of just manpower to draw the apparatus. That was just about the time that internal combustion engines came into common use.
Congratulations to Colin (used to post here as "MetraKid2"), who was recently promoted to locomotive engineer on BNSF, and will evidently be working out of LaCrosse, Wisconsin.
work busy.ns has a westbound waiting and cars to pick up uptown.matt helped grandpa and grandma all day today.time to get cleaned up for supper.
Ah, my laptop again gives me choices.
It's nice and cool up here--still only 60 degrees out on my balcony. We had rain last night, and I was able to get a walk in before it started again.
As to parking when I came back up after church Sunday, I had no trouble finding a place in the Iron Blosam lot--perhaps the Oktoberfest visitors paid attention to signs that forbade their parking in the lot.
On Mondays, there is a welcoming reception for people at the Iron Blosam, and there were, as usual, some who who are here every year at this time and some who are here for the first time. Yesterday, three other regulars and I reminisced about a man who, with his wife, had spent the entire summer up here for as long as they both lived; the couple had bought several different units and moved from one to another during the season.
rumbles and grumbles but no rain yet.Ns had an eastbound and the local was having a crew change uptown.time for chores.
Mookie Murphy Siding [snipped - PDN] . . . When I was a kid in Alaska, in the 60's, we lived 23 miles outside of Anchorage, the big city. My sister's husband had picked me up at school, and there was a house fire just up the road. He stopped to see if he could help, and found that the whole fire crew was housewives, and the highway was full of station wagons full of school kids. Yessss!
Murphy Siding [snipped - PDN] . . . When I was a kid in Alaska, in the 60's, we lived 23 miles outside of Anchorage, the big city. My sister's husband had picked me up at school, and there was a house fire just up the road. He stopped to see if he could help, and found that the whole fire crew was housewives, and the highway was full of station wagons full of school kids.
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