WSC'S War Stories: Trinidad desk July 10, 2001

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WHISKEY SIERRA CHARLIE's
WAR STORIES

Trinidad desk: Tuesday, July 10, 2001.

The following story is not a particularly interesting one, but does provide a look at a more-or-less typical afternoon shift on the BNSF Trinidad dispatching desk, which covers the former Colorado & Southern territory between Texline, Texas and Pueblo, Colorado. I'm including the story mainly as a sample, to see whether I (or anyone who reads it) likes this format.

We've had a steel gang working on the Twin Peaks Sub between Des Moines and Grande, New Mexico for the past couple weeks. The work that they're doing requires several hours of track time, meaning eastbounds must be staged at Trinidad and westbounds held at Texline during the early morning hours to avoid a backup of trains around the work location. When I came in to work, three eastbounds (2 coal loads and an M-DENTPL) were climbing the hill between Trinchere and Branson. Opposing them were a coal empty out of Texline, and another empty on duty at Texline -- which had been there since 5 in the morning, and on which the crew would have to couple a crossing and perform an air test before rolling out.

First shift had given the first empty a track warrant to take the siding at Grenville while the steel gang cleared up. If the steel gang took too long, we'd have the three eastbounds stacked up at Des Moines, and the first empty would be stuck at Grenville for well over an hour meeting them, and the second empty would be stuck at Royce. The siding at Grande was out of service with steel gang machines and surfacing equipment. Fortunately, the steel gang cleared up on time, and I was able to move the first empty to Des Moines to meet the three eastbounds, while bringing the second empty to Grenville.

In the meantime, the second load got down to about 5 mph climbing the hill between Folsom and Des Moines. This is one of two locations on the Twin Peaks Sub where coal loads frequently lay down (stall) on the hill. If they had, it wouldn't have caused too much trouble since I had the MDENTPL right behind them to shove them if necessary. If that had happened, the MDENTPL could have left his train at Folsom and shoved the load over the hill to Des Moines, and then I could have let the first empty out of Des Moines to follow the MDENTPL's light power back to Folsom. But fortunately , it didn't come to that. I ended up running all three eastbounds into Texline back to back. The two loads had Amarillo crews on duty to take the trains out, but Amarillo Yard requested that the Amarillo dispatcher hold the MDENTPL at Texline, so he ended up tying down in # 2 track.

Meanwhile, I held an MAMADEN on Pass 1 at Trinidad all day because Pueblo did not want us to call it. Trinidad remained more or less fluid, however, since the main and Pass 2 were both clear. I had the first empty called out at 1745, and the second one at 1850. The first eastbound from Pueblo was a coal load that had to fuel, so he went into Pass 2, arriving at 1730 and leaving at 1905 with an 1815 crew.

I had a couple of new slow orders to protect today... two of them were 25 mph orders for one train only that the steel gang foreman had given us. The foreman removed both of these orders after the first train went over them. Another was a heat-related slow order near Barela which was only effective until 2100, so almost everybody got that one. It must be cooling down; the detectors were broadcasting temperatures in the low 90s. During the Fourth of July holiday, the heat absolutely killed us... it must have been the hottest day of the summer so far. I took at least five or six slow orders, and the main had to be taken out of service west of Trinidad for an hour or so due to a minor sun kink (that's "thermal misallignment" if you're speaking in politically correct terms). Yesterday when I worked the Amarillo desk, the detectors were broadcasting temperatures in excess of 100 degrees. I think the hottest one I heard was 104.

Just another summer day on the railroad...

WSC

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