Western Railroad Discussion > Railfans Searching For Alcohol in the Middle of the Night

While sane railfans were sleeping last night, some less-than-sane railfans were traveling
through the night is search of alcohol. More specifically, in search of U SIOPTN7 07A, a
BNSF ethanol load from Sioux City, Iowa to the PTRA in Houston because NS 1069, Norfolk
Southern's Virginian heritage unit, was leading the train.

After sitting in Fort Worth most of the day yesterday, the train finally reached Temple
about 1930. When we learned that the outbound crew was on duty at 2000, we decided to head
north to photograph the train because we had work commitments today that would prevent us
from photographing it in Houston
.
#1- Our first photo location was at Lyons, near MP 145.5 of BNSF's Galveston sub.
Lyons is about 4 miles north of Somerville. We only had to wait about 30 minutes while
the DS ran a SB and a NB by our location. I'm not superstitious by any stretch,
but NS 1069 passed by our cameras at 0013 on 6/13.

#2 - Our next planned photo location was Sealy, MP 94. We expected to wait a bit for the train,
but the dispatcher's decision to put NS 1069 in at Phillipsburg to meet 4 NB's made the wait
significantly longer. Finally, at 0237, NS 1069 passed under the signal bridge at CP943 in Sealy.

A hoped for photo-op at Rosenberg did not materialize account the train being routed on to the
UP at T17. Which was just as well because I had an assignment in downtown Houston at 0830.
By the time I got home it was nearly 0400 and I had to get up at 0630. As I write this at 1100,
I can feel the effect of 2.5 hours of sleep, but sacrificing some sleep to catch one of the
better looking NS heritage units is a small price to pay.

Robert Pierce
Sugar Land, TX
SWRails.com

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Second up is the only ex-Conrail C40-8W on NS with high number boards.

Bill Miller
Galt, ON

Fantastic pair! That second shot is really special. What an Awesome catch!

Definitely worth losing sleep over

Memories of O. Winston Link
Nice.

Two candidates for IOTD in my book. Just the sheer determination and time involved should earn you that honor. Plus the photos are sweet!

Valleyman

Great shots!  Thanks for going out there and posting the results.
GK

Great shots again Robert! Here in Asheville (NC) we're going to have to wait a few weeks till they get the line open again after the mudslides down on the Loops east of Ridgecrest. Supposedly early July before they can get it all stabilized.
Mike

good light distribution

Fantastic shots. Can you give us amathers some hints on how to take pics like these? Did you use an external light source? The locomotives are very well iluminated and I can not see a sign of flash lights. What speed and aperture did you use? Of course, the camera model do the difference too.

Posted from Android

Pedro Rezende
Vespasiano MG,
https://youtube.com/c/minasgeraisrailways1

Wow, these are the best night photos of the 1069 I've seen ever. Also 1069 is my favorite heritage, so this makes it even better.

pedrop Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Fantastic shots. Can you give us amathers some
> hints on how to take pics like these? Did you use
> an external light source? The locomotives are very
> well iluminated and I can not see a sign of flash
> lights. What speed and aperture did you use? Of
> course, the camera model do the difference too.

Bom dia Pedro.

Lighting was 5 off-camera Yongnuo YN-660 flashes on 9' light stands facing track from about 60' away,
Flashes were controlled by Vello remote flash triggering system. Canon 6D with the 24-105 L lens,
ISO 1000, 1/250 second at f4.0.

Robert Pierce
Sugar Land, TX
SWRails.com

If you need to move that corn liquor by night, ask a good ol' boy aka Virginian.

That is one sharp motor!

Posted from Android

Thanks TexBob. It is always interesting to know how the professionals work.

Pedro

TexBob Wrote:

> Bom dia Pedro.
>
> Lighting was 5 off-camera Yongnuo YN-660 flashes
> on 9' light stands facing track from about 60'
> away,
> Flashes were controlled by Vello remote flash
> triggering system. Canon 6D with the 24-105 L
> lens,
> ISO 1000, 1/250 second at f4.0.

Pedro Rezende
Vespasiano MG,
https://youtube.com/c/minasgeraisrailways1



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/15/18 17:41 by pedrop.