NS to Test CNG Tender

Norfolk Southern plans to put into service a locomotive tender that won’t be carrying coal but compressed natural gas.

The tender was built by Kasgro Rail in New Castle, Pennsylvania, for CNGMotive.

It resembles a traditional well car for containers with the well section containing natural gas storage and the ends of the car having a control system and pressure reduction system.

Tender GCNX No. 5001 has 28 separate CNG storage tanks in two groups for a storage capacity equal to 4,600 gallons of diesel fuel, also known as diesel gallon equivalent.

NS plans to use the tender on trains hauling export coal between Williamson, West Virginia, and Lamberts Point, Virginia.

It will begin revenue service once final assembly and testing of the tender is complete and NS receives a letter of concurrence from the Federal Railroad Administration.

The tender is designed to provide compressed natural gas to one or two locomotives and its design complies with the upcoming AAR Tender Specification M-1004 for crash worthiness, shock, and vibration.

NS does not have any six axle locomotives with the capacity to operate on both diesel fuel and compress natural gas so it is borrowing a pair of SD70ACE units from BNSF that are so equipped.

Testing of the tender on NS is expected to begin later this year or in early 2020 and last for a six month trial.

Refueling will occur at Shaffer’s Crossing in Roanoke, Virginia.

Look, It’s a Caboose!

Cabooses were once ubiquitous on freight trains in America. But railroads did away with them as a cost saving measure.

It is still possible to see a caboose today, particularly on a local where a caboose is now known as a shoving platform.

But it is rare, although not unheard of, to see a caboose on the rear of an intercity freight.

You have to be ready to respond quickly if you want to get a photograph.

Shown is a caboose owned by Kasgro Rail Corporation of New Castle, Pennsylvania. The company’s website says that it provides heavy-duty rail cars. These include flat deck and depressed deck cars.

Kasgro’s website shows that it owns four cabooses, but 072, which is shown here on an eastbound CSX manifest freight passing through Berea, is not one of them. It might be new to the fleet or has been sold to another entity.

Whatever the case the car is being ferried to its next assignment.

Photograph by Craig Sanders