FL9

I thought about venturing out only as far a Boaz Park today, but listening on the scanner to the number of wrecks close to home that Benbrook P.D. was working on the icy streets, I decided to stay home.  The KCS “Frozen Weed” get-together is scheduled for next weekend around Rich Mountain, but it looks like I will be working and unable to attend.  So instead, I scanned a few older shots from the KCS slide box as a small tribute.

First up is a loaded KCS coal train southbound with two SD40’s and three BN C30-7’s climbing the grade into Gentry, Arkansas in 1986.

(Read on …)

It was overcast, cold, windy, and trainless at the west end of Centennial this evening, so tonight’s memory takes us back to a better and busier scene last summer.

Saturday afternoon on July 30th, 2005 found me on top of the Meacham Boulevard overpass in north Fort Worth lining up for a shot of a southbound BNSF loaded coal train leaving Saginaw Yard. Nothing spectacular, but we were both there at the same time, measured by the digital camera to be 4:54:18 pm. I think it is a tremendous advance to have all your technical data stored automatically with each photo, and I used it to document just how quickly the rest of this sequence unfolded.

(Read on …)

Today on the way home from work the west end of UP’s Centennial Yard was once again deserted, so I decided to pull up a picture from better times. Over the Thanksgiving holiday in 2003 there was a minor derailment out west somewhere, so traffic for the Baird Sub had backed up in Fort Worth. When I passed by the west end of the yard shortly after noon on the 27th the line had just been reopened. A brief walk up onto the Bryant Irvin overpass resulted in this shot of no less than four trains were waiting their turn to leave for the west coast.

Nothing was seen on the way home today, so once again I turned to the old slide files. Since we were local yesterday, I decided to head back to my eastern roots today. I learned the art of railfanning back in the 1970’s under the kind tutelage of excellent photographers Ed Blackman and Dan Foley, who still practice the craft today. Back in August 1970 on one such trip, we caught this westbound Erie Lackawanna freight with six F-units and one U-25B about to cross the Delaware River at Sparrow Bush, NY.