Patience Was a Virtue

Here is something that took over seven and a half years to get. The first two photos are from September 2012. The 8025 was the first Heritage Unit I got with my new digital camera. It is shown crossing the old Painesville trestle over the Grand River that was built by the Nickel Plate Road.

On Wednesday I saw on HeritageUnits.com that the Monongahela H unit was on the lead of 22K. Patience is a virtue. I got it on the Norfolk Southern bridge over the Grand River in Painesville on the Lake Erie District.

Article and Photograph by Edward Ribinskas

Catching the MGA H Unit on the NS Chicago Line

NS 8025, the Monongahela heritage locomotive, serves as the DPU on a 65R empty crude oil tankers train. It is shown headed west through Edgerton, Ohio, on Sunday, July 14, 2013.

Fellow ARRC member Peter Bowler and I had as our objective exploring Norfolk Southern’s Chicago Line in western Ohio this past Sunday.

We took a meandering route to get there, finally reaching Edgerton, Ohio, just after noon.

We were just in time for the high, harsh sunlight of the day and a westbound coal train that passed through just after we arrived.

We were standing next to a street near the tracks discussing our next move when we saw a headlight to the east. Another train was running on the block of the coal train.

The lighting conditions — such as they were — favored eastbounds, but we moved to the other side of south side of the tracks to see what we could make of the shot with the grain elevator.

After the head end passed, it quickly became apparent that this was a crude oil train. Peter had checked online about two hours earlier to see if any heritage units were going to be in the region.

He said the Monongahela unit had been reported on a westbound train, the 65R, but it was not leading. Then he said something about a DPU that I didn’t understand. Somehow I translated all of that to mean the MGA unit was in the trailing position on the head end.

We had no idea where the 65R was and I had not thought much about it. Now, here it was right in front of us and the MGA unit was the DPU unit.

After the 65R had passed and traffic began moving again at the U.S. 6 grade crossing, a car pulled over and an elderly couple asked us what that train was.

So we briefly explained the basics of crude oil trains running between North Dakota and Delaware, and about NS heritage units. They thanked us for the information and moved on.

After the 65R with the MGA unit in the DPU position passed, we saw the headlight of an eastbound and stuck around in Edgerton to photograph that train. We figured we had seen the last of the MGA unit.

Our next destination was Butler, Ind., where I wanted to check out a bridge that carries a county road over the NS Chicago line west of town.

I had heard about this bridge from Marty Surdyk, but had never been there, except passing under it aboard Amtrak.

In the meantime, the 65R had come to stop at Butler and we caught up with it just as the train was starting to move.

Perhaps we could get the MGA unit one more time. At this point, we didn’t know exactly where the bridge we were seeking was located.

Things were starting to look grim as we tried to get through town as fast as we could on U.S. 6. But the street had a 35 mph speed limit and a few traffic lights.

We could see the train by looking down the cross streets and see that it was gaining speed. At one point it looked like Amtrak speeding along.

As luck would have it, the ramp leading to the bridge we were seeking was on the west edge of Butler. We would not get there in time to photograph the head end power, but there was nothing out of ordinary about that.

The train was at least halfway past the bridge when we finally got stopped and jumped out. Another railfan and his young daughter were already up there taking photographs.

It didn’t take long for the DPU to come out from beneath the bridge and into my viewfinder.

The final shot of the sequence presented here shows the MGA unit about to pass through a set of crossovers. The 65R is on Track No. 1 and if you look closely down Track No. 2 you will see a speck that is the head end of an eastbound Canadian Pacific manifest freight that was waiting for the 65R to clear.

Once that occurred, the CP train would cross over to Track 1 and then get onto the former Wabash at Butler to head for Detroit.

Yes, we stuck around for the CP train, but I’ll show you those images in another story to be posted later this week.

Article and Photographs by Craig Sanders

The all white tank cars cut a swatch through the Indiana farmland west of Butler, Ind.

NS 8025 pops into my viewfinder.

The 65R is about to clear the crossovers west of Butler. Once it does, the CP manifest freight in the distance will cross over from Track 2 to Track 1.

My Early Digital Images

I bought my Nikon digital SLR camera in last summer. As often happens when you make the transition from film to digital there is an overlap period in which you are still shooting off the film that you have left while also getting digital images with your new camera.

Here are three of my first digital images made with my new Nikon.

I didn’t have to go far for the first two. I caught an NS intermodal train crossing the trestle in Painesville over the Grand River on Sept. 2, 2012. This is just a few minutes from my home. The perspective is from Riverview Drive.

The attraction of this train was NS 8025, the Monongahela heritage locomotive, which was in the trailing position of this stack train.

Also shown is LTEX 1420 on the Cuyahoga Valley Scenic Railroad leading one of the scenic trains at Brecksville with the iconic Ohio Route 82 bridge over the Cuyahoga River in the background on Sept. 12.

Photographs by Edward Ribinskas

MGA 8025 on the NS Manor Branch

Much to our delight, the 8025 was facing away from the train. I didn’t written down the location of all of our photo spots, but I believe this is along Martin Road or Crouse Road.

My opportunities to photograph Norfolk Southern heritage locomotives are fewer and farther between than I’d like. Even rarer are my opportunities to catch one of the units on a line formerly owned by the heritage railroad to which the locomotive pays homage.

So when my friend Adam and I learned that NS 8025 – the Monongahela unit – had been assigned to helper service on ex-Monongahela rails, we made tracks for southwestern Pennsylvania on Sunday morning.

We had photographed Mon line operations in West Brownsville, even catching the New York Central and Savannah & Atlanta heritage locomotives leading a train down the street last June. But we had never seen, let alone photographed, the Manor Branch or any other ex-Mon line south of West Brownsville.

Adam did some crash research and plotted a route that would follow the tracks from the Bailey Mine to Waynesburg. We got to the area about 10:30 a.m. and drove along the tracks toward the mine.

We could have wished for better weather. The skies were overcast and unlikely to change. The gray and browns of winter added little color. But we didn’t have the luxury of waiting for better weather. Either we got the MGA 8025 on this Sunday or we didn’t get it at all. This might be our only opportunity to catch this locomotive on former Monongahela rails.

We caught our first break when Adam spotted the helper units idling behind a low concrete wall near the mine. The 8025 was paired with the NS 8016.

A CSX coal train was a few hundred feet closer to the mine and inching it way toward the helpers. Had we arrived 10 or so minutes later we would have missed the helper units because the CSX train would have blocked them from our view.

We drove around a bit to explore the area. I dug out my radio and around 11 a.m. the Mon Line dispatcher gave the CSX train a track warrant. Subsequent conversations between the head end and the helpers indicated that the helpers were tied on and ready to roll.  And so were we.

We chased the CSX train to Sycamore, where the helpers were cut off.

Both the CSX train and the helpers had to wait for an NS train of empty hoppers en route to Bailey Mine to pass. We caught the NS train at Ingram Hill Road.

The helpers then moved on to the Waynesburg yard where the crew tied them down and turned them off. A local railfan was there photographing the units and said a trainmaster had told him that the NS train we had seen going to Bailey Mine would not load until about midnight.

With no more trains to help for several hours, the helpers would be off duty for awhile.

After getting some last photos of the 8025, we made a foray to the Cumberland Mine, where all was quiet and a gang was out doing track work. We then headed for Sheetz in Waynesburg for a late lunch.

Article and Photographs by Craig Sanders

Further down the line, we are along Crouse Road and the train is passing through a cut.

The same location as above, but looking in the opposite direction.

A grab shot on a road whose name I neglected to record.

The head end of the CSX coal train with CSX No. 59 rounds a curve as it approaches Hopewell Ridge Road

A going away shot from the crossing of Hopewell Ridge Road.

An NS train with empty hopper cars is en route to Bailey Mine. It is nearing the crossing with Ingram Hill Road.

The crew’s day is done and it’s time to tie down the power at the Waynesburg yard.

It’s early afternoon but the helper units won’t be needed again until around midnight when the next coal trail will be loading at Bailey mine.So the units will enjoy some time off in the Waynesburg yard.

It Was Just One Messed Up Day

The 8025 on 11V at Hudson, Ohio, on Thursday, Sept. 20, 2012.

I read Alex Bruchac’s report on the Norfolk Southern heritage locomotive no shows. That day was one messed up day. I was on duty from 6:30 a.m. to 9:30 p.m.

That afternoon I did some fast figuring on that 11V with the Monongahela unit leading as we were heading to Hudson to spin some stone power.

It seemed like it would be a close meet with us due to all the backed up westbound traffic.

Sure enough, no sooner did we report in the clear on the east leg of the wye at Hudson that a headlight appeared in the east.

I stepped out onto my “office veranda” and grabbed a quick photo. I wasn’t concerned about the 552 since both the Illinois Terminal and Southern heritage locomotives were buried in the consist.

One plan that was considered had the helper power cutting off and attaching to the head end. That would have put the Southern unit in the lead, but that plan was canceled.

The OCS was not “rerouted.” It was scheduled to go via Mansfield and was running ahead of the 11V out of Conway. That 11V with the MGA unit was the first train I’ve shot since returning home from vacation.

As it turned out, the first train I shot as I made my way west on vacation two weeks ago was the NS 205, also with the MGA leading.

Article and Photographs by Roger Durfee

The 8025 on No. 205 at MP 259 on the Chicago Line.

The 8025 at MP 311. Note the older New York Central milepost on the left.

The 8025 at Waterloo, Ind. We gave up the westward chase after taking this photo.

When the Monogahela Met the Cuyahoga and Other Tales of Norfolk Southern Heritage Units

I landed photographs of two Norfolk Southern heritage locomotives over the weekend, both in Cleveland.

The top photograph of Bridge 2 is my photo of NS train 205 with the Monongalela heritage unit leading that I like to call “Where the Monongahela meets the Cuyahoga.”
The clouds had thickened by the time the train had refueled and recrewed at Rockport Yard, so there was no sun on the shot at Sheldon Road just east of Berea.
On Monday, in one of the more interesting consists I’ve seen in a while, the Central of Georgia heritage locomotive was paired with EMDX 2012 on the 11V.

Again, other commitments that morning found me heading for Lewis Road just west of Berea to intercept it.

The sun would be the best there and there was a signal bridge and milepost to add some interest to the photo, e.g., not just “engine shots.”

A cloud and NS 14N almost skunked me there, but luck was with me and both cleared just in time. Note the dark trees in the distance and the EOT of the 14N.

After a quick run on the Ohio Turnpike to Route 250, I headed for the Strecker Road crossing in hopes of one more photo of this interesting duo. The wait was short with the clouds clearing just in time once again.
After getting the above MGA photographs, I was off to the Cleveland Air Show at Burke Lakefront Airport.

A Canadian fighter jet put on a great show, seen here just shy of the sound barrier.

Later, I caught the nose of a westbound NS train passing in the distance behind a V22 Osprey (I think).

Article and Photographs by Roger Durfee

Gray Lady Visits Northeast Ohio

Norfolk Southern heritage locomotive 8025 leads westbound train No. 205 over the former Nickel Plate Trestle in Cleveland on Saturday morning, Sept. 1, 2012. The locomotive pays tribute to the Monongahela Railroad.

Norfolk Southern’s Monongahela Railroad heritage locomotive passed through Northeast Ohio on Saturday morning (Sept. 1, 2012) on the head of train 205, a westbound intermodal.

The locomotive had passed through the area eastward earlier in the week and, as expected, it turned and came back west from New York State.

The 8025 is unusual in that it was not among the original batch of heritage locomotives that NS announced earlier this year. It also is the only heritage locomotive that was not ordered new with the intention of being a heritage locomotive.

Instead, the 8025 was an existing locomotive that was painted into the Monongahela livery.

I went out to chase the train with my friend Adam Barr. We first caught up with it at Abby Road in Cleveland just west of the trestle over the Flats on the NS Cleveland District (former Nickel Plate Road). There was a crowd of photographers here including Akron Railroad Club member Roger Durfee.

We easily caught up with train 205 at Olmsted Falls but had a hard time catching it west of there. Our initial plan to get the train at Bay Bridge west of Sandusky didn’t work.  It was crossing the bridge and causeway as we arrived on nearby U.S. Route 2. We settled for a crossing west of Port Clinton. By then the weather had deteriorated considerably to cloudy and overcast.

After photographing the 205, we went into Port Clinton for a late lunch and shot a few more trains at Bay Bridge.

Photographs by Craig Sanders

Bridges, bridges everywhere. The NS 8025 passes through a maze of bridges in the Cleveland Flats.

Heading west on Track 2 at Olmsted Falls after a crew change at Rockport Yard.

Cruising along Three Mile Crossing Road west of Port Clinton.

Catching the Monongahela Heritage Locomotive

Here are some photographs of the Norfolk Southern 8025, the Monongahela heritage locomotive, that I took on Sunday, Aug. 12, 2012.

It was leading a very short No. 170 eastbound. We were down in the Conway area to catch and ride the 765 trips, but got word this unit was behind 16E and not in the yard yet.

Even though it was almost 9 a.m. and time for the first 765 run, we decided to gamble. In a moment of perfect timing we saw it drifting down main No. 1 toward Rochester as we rounded a curve on Pennsylvania Route 65.

I managed to nail it just west of CP Rochester, passing under the classic Pennsylvania Railroad signals on the east side of CP Rochester and then at East Conway.

Between the last two photos we bagged a slightly late running 765 blasting east at East Conway.

Article and Photographs by Roger Durfee