After capturing the eastbound UP intermodal just after sunrise in Sweetwater, Troy and I spotted one of UP’s super hi-railers parked in the house track with three loaded ballast cars. I don’t know the official name for this thing, but you know it is a serious hauler when it has its own sand pipes in front of the wheels just like a locomotive.
By mid-afternoon we had the U-Haul truck loaded with furniture and things from dad’s house to bring back to Fort Worth. We parked the truck behind the barn for the night and decided to drive over to Roscoe to check out Eagle Railcar’s CF7 as J.R. Leal had reported on Railspot that it had a brand new paint job. Heading west on I20 we found ourselves pacing a westbound stack train out of Sweetwater so we made sure that we got to Roscoe first for this view of the UP 7357 at the main crossing.
Eagle Railcar’s CF7 did indeed have a new paint scheme, but it was parked in shadow between two cuts of cars so we decided to return in the morning for a second chance. Arriving back in Sweetwater we stopped by the BNSF yard for a static shot of the Texas & Oklahoma SD9’s as this was not a work day for them.
The radio warned us of the approach of the ZAILC passing through Eskota, so we situated ourselves on the Business I20 overpass at the east end of town. As this train originated in Atlanta we should not have been surprised when it arrived with an all NS lashup.
As the train stopped to change crews we set up again, this time at the first crossing west of the depot where we caught them accelerating out of town a few minutes later. The trio of NS ponies should be right at home in Sweetwater since the local footaball team is the “Mustangs.”
Another “Z” train was only twenty minutes behind, this time with two UP units up front that we photographed passing the foundation of the old depot and T&P historical marker.
It had been a long day, so we called it quits here and left the endless procession of trains on the Baird Sub to continue through the night.
