Kicking off Halloween weekend with some old pumpkins. This shot is from April 2004 at NS Inman Yard in Atlanta GA. Two train loads of powder river coal with all BNSF power sit side by side waiting to head south to deliver their cargos and head back out west.
It would seem those wires are not used any more. At least a few would be grounding out from that vine.
About thirty five years back, the "Mount Rainier" is arriving at Tacoma, Washington on a sunny afternoon. It won't be much longer until reaching Seattle:
Dad and I would hang out in that parking lot, great spot, till they blocked it all off for the track reroute.
I don't have many BNSF "pumpkins" on file, so I'll go with MILW orange and black. August 1981, Des Plaines, IL. He'll cross the C&NW's Wisconsin Sub just ahead. Next stop, the MILW's Bensenville Yard.
Here's another set of "Halloween" units. Hmmmm, maybe these look more like candy corn than pumpkins......
Yeah, the wires were abandoned by then. Not too long after that, BNSF contracted to have the lines removed. A company came along and just chain sawed the poles down to salvage the wire and collect the insulators. They dropped a pole right on a section of the wrought iron perimeter fence at the museum in Rosenberg. They replaced the section and let us keep the offending pole as well as a wheel barrow full of insulators. We sell those in the gift shop and have made a lot of money out of that. Our pole before we set it up on the inside of the fence.
No Pumpkins here. On October 19, NS H99 has been told by the dispatcher that they won't be going West from Wyo JCT for at least two hours. Certainly an unusual consist of a former CNOTP GP50 rebuilt into a GP38-3, an ex-CR GP40-2, a road slug that began life as a SOU GP38AC, and a NS GP59E. I haven't seen that many narrow cab units on a train in years on NS.
The head end of another pumpkin patch mega-train. It sat right here for several hours, with all three schemes of pumpkin in the set!
More pumpkins on the eastbound Northgate Local, from a few weeks ago, Lonetree, ND: Westbound grain loads grind over Gassman Coulee after sunset:
Here we are on a STODEN sitting in the west pass at Glenwood 1998, with a UP EB coal load sitting in the east pass, not a wheel turning for 50 miles all waiting on the govt local (Amtk). Caught this kind of rare unit, in consist.
Some more pumpkins, Sept. 2014, Eastbound from Belen to Clovis and passing through Willard, New Mexico :
Wow!! A -7, one of my favorite diesels to work on, in pumpkin paint!! I didn't know they ever even did that!!
