This past Saturday. One of their super sized trains, it looks like at or near the mid-train power. Several mentions and videos on line. Here is just one: https://www.kcci.com/article/carlis...leanup-expected-following-derailment/38114410
Wow, that's an ugly one! Good thing that loco didn't turn over and catch that lumber on fire, coulda' been a lot worse then. Woulda' been more "salt" on the wound.....
These monsters just keep growing, and I always wonder what might happen if the DPUs glitch one way or another. Putting them on the ground anywhere is one thing, it's a whole new ball of wax if it happens on the big trestle west of town! They reach almost 3 miles long. Double grain, manifests, even S and Q trains have been doubled (S-trains have less priority than grain trains). Almost anything but a Z will be doubled in my neck of the woods.
They will push these as far as they can. Longer and longer. Until a major disaster. Thinking they are somehow saving money....
I'm not convinced this will cause any major headaches for shipping. Generally speaking (not specifically for this area), the rail network as a whole, especially with coal way down, has lots of capacity to reroute trains. Now crew availability (jobs, vacancies, PSR craziness, etc) on the other hand... That's a mess.
Remember that re-routes are not necessarily immediate. They can take a few phone calls or more... Repositioning of crews, etc, can also take up a day or two. Then some trains will simply be held in place, (days delayed), or must be moved backwards and restarted. There has been a bit more coal moving than in the past few months, as winter panic sets in, long after stockpiling should have happened. Also, these huge trains do not transit as fast as past smaller versions. Shipping is in such a snarl that two months ago a person connected to Long Beach informed me that we would be seeing Christmas items in February. My employer has been receiving items we should have had in July and August, and we have no idea what to do with the stuff. We are already jammed to the rafters in the warehouse, with stuff which is out of season now. Plus, we were told just this past week that the February scenario was going to be absolute fact.
NS is reworking a siding and signaling in Carlisle, SC to extend the siding length to 15,000 FT, or nearly three miles. I sometimes watch the railcam located on the mainline at Spartanburg and given the juggling of movements, I see why NS is making this improvement.
Through the past decade, BNSF has extended a bunch of sidings on the High Line. But there are still some not long enough. There has even been talk of double tracking, but with the several large coulee bridges in MT and ND, plus the tunnels in MT and WA, there are still significant choke points.
Why, I'm surprised the nuts are not declaring the spilled salt a hazard and demanding an evacuation within a 20 mile radius out of fear of raising everybody's blood pressure. Doug
The local Barnes & Noble bookstore just received and put out for sale the August issue of Railroad Model Craftsman.