Nostalgia & History > BN - Gillette, WY record of train movements 5/20/80

Some of this info is hard to read but I'll do my best:



Eastward Trains


Engine: 8032 train: NA time arrived: 12:45am, time departed: 1am (through freight)

Engine: 8018 train: NA time arrived: 1:10am, time departed: train yarded at Gillette (local)

Engine: 5547 train: 04DD034 time arrived: 3:40am, time departed: 5:30am (coal load)

Engine: 5582 train: 42JJ004 time arrived: 7:00am, time departed: 11:55am (coal load)

Engine: 5525 train: 79HH045 time arrived: 12:45pm, time departed: 1:20pm (coal load)

Engine: 5133 train: 01X16 time arrived: 1:10pm, time departed: 2:20pm (grain empty)

Engine: 5012 train: #368 time arrived: 1:25pm, time departed: train yarded at Gillette

Engine: 5818 train: 38YY016 time arrived: 3:25pm, time departed: 3:40pm (coal load)

Engine: 7196 train: 20DD016 time arrived: 3:45pm, time departed: 5:40pm (coal load)

Engine: 7270 train: 74AA047 time arrived: 5:59pm, time departed: NA (coal load)

Engine: 5804 train: 42DD008 time arrived: 6:55pm, time departed: 7:45pm (coal load)

Engine: 8101 train: 01PSH20 time arrived: 8:05pm, time departed: 8:20pm (through freight)

Engine: 5132 train: 92PP015 time arrived: 11:00pm, time departed: NA (coal load)

Engine: 5037 train: 20RR028 time arrived: 11:15pm, time departed: 11:25pm (coal load)

Engine: 8028 train: 01SPD20 time arrived: 11:30pm, time departed: 11:40pm (through freight)



Westward Trains

Engine: 5048 train: 45QQ160 time arrived: 2:25am, time departed: 3:20am (coal load west via Sheridan)

Engine: 7196 train: 37YY017 time arrived: 3:10am, time departed: 3:35am (Decker coal load west via Sheridan)

Engine: 5804 train: 39YY009 time arrived: 5:50am, time departed: 6:15am (another Decker load west via Sheridan)

Engine: 5582 train: 40JJ008 time arrived: 8:15am, time departed: NA (in holding pattern east Gillette)

Engine: 7807 train: 01HSP19 time arrived: 9:10am, time departed: 9:20am (through freight)

Engine: 7886 train: #369 time arrived: NA, time departed: 12:30pm (departed from Gillette Yard)

Engine: 5525 train: 92AA044 time arrived: 3:05pm, time departed: 3:50pm (coal load - note the 5525 in the eb table)

Engine: 8158 train: 01DPS21 time arrived: 4:40pm, time departed: 5:05pm (through freight)

Engine: 5037 train: 19RR029 time arrived: 8:30pm, time departed: NA (coal empty)

Engine: 7179 train: 46NN051 time arrived: 10:05pm, time departed: 10:10pm (coal empty??)

Engine: 7125 train: 39DD009 time arrived: 10:15pm, time departed: 10:25pm (coal empty)

Engine: 7270 train: 77AA046 time arrived: 10:35pm, time departed: 11:05pm (coal load west via Sheridan??)

Engine: 5132 train: 97AA014 time arrived: 11:25pm, time departed: NA


A bit confusing since you had coal loads and empties going both east and west. Maybe someone can shed more light on the above symbols and make more sense of this than I can.


Allen



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 10/24/09 23:04 by bradleymckay.

Loaded coal trains still run each way today. Coal from the mines on the Orin and Campbell lines that join the main east of Gillette head west to power plants in the upper Midwest via the northern coal corridor (ex-NP main) and to the Pacific Northwest, and coal from mines on the Dutch line just east of Sheridan and from mines in the Fort Union formation in Montana head west through Gillette to power plants in the Midwest or South via Alliance and/or Lincoln. I just videotaped this line between Gillette and Sheridan on Ulm Hill, ~30 miles east of Sheridan (a manned pusher grade for loaded coal trains in each direction) in late September. There are fewer trains between Gillette and Sheridan today thanks to only there being only one through manifest and no intermodal trains although the coal train cound is similar with 6 or 7 each way. In the early 1990s there were as many as four intermodal trains in each direction on peak days of the week. Now there is none. BNSF gave up trying to get intermodal trains through the sea of coal trains between Lincoln and Gillete many years ago.
Dick Eisfeller
Big "E" Productions
Greenland, NH

Allen, all that alphabet was for mines, the numbers, or at least some of them, how many trains orginated from that mine that year,IIRC. Also BN was in alpha symbols.. PSH I think was Portland Seattle Houston, later BN196.

TAW I think can help more on this.

WAF Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Allen, all that alphabet was for mines, the
> numbers, or at least some of them, how many trains
> orginated from that mine that year,IIRC. Also BN
> was in alpha symbols.. PSH I think was Portland
> Seattle Houston, later BN196.
>
> TAW I think can help more on this.

I found something that might be helpful here though I don't know if it's 100% accurate for 1980:

AA - Belle Ayr Mine
DD - West Decker
HH - Eagle Butte Mine
KK - Jacob's Ranch Mine
JJ - Buckskin Mine
NN - Nerco/Spring Creek Mine
PP - Kiewit Mine (Decker, MT)
QQ - Caballo Mine
RR - Rawhide Mine
TT - Black Thunder Mine
VV - Cordero Mine
YY - East Decker, MT


Allen



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/25/09 21:19 by bradleymckay.

It's close. I know one three digit number was the number of moves from that mine for that train

> Maybe someone can shed more light on the above symbols and make more sense of this than I can.

As I recall, the system BN used to identify coal trains back then worked as follows:
numbers = YTD trains running from the mine to the power plant
letters = code for the mine where the train loaded
numbers = code for the route/destination of the train

So, to pick one of the trains from your list:
42JJ004 would have been the 42nd train that year to run from Buckskin Mine (code JJ) to Ft. Towson, OK (code 004).

Here's a link to a list of BNSF coal origin/destination codes:

http://www.qstation.org/bnsf/bnsfcoal.html

included in that list are many of the old BN coal codes that you can use to "decode" the coal trains symbols.


Take care,

Mark

WAF Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Allen, all that alphabet was for mines, the
> numbers, or at least some of them, how many trains
> orginated from that mine that year,IIRC. Also BN
> was in alpha symbols.. PSH I think was Portland
> Seattle Houston, later BN196.
>
> TAW I think can help more on this.

So, Wes, the SPD was Seattle, Portland, Denver??


AM



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/25/09 21:37 by bradleymckay.

mamfahr Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> > Maybe someone can shed more light on the above
> symbols and make more sense of this than I can.
>
> As I recall, the system BN used to identify coal
> trains back then worked as follows:
> numbers = YTD trains running from the mine to the
> power plant
> letters = code for the mine where the train
> loaded
> numbers = code for the route/destination of the
> train
>
> So, to pick one of the trains from your list:
> 42JJ004 would have been the 42nd train that year
> to run from Buckskin Mine (code JJ) to Ft. Towson,
> OK (code 004).
>
> Here's a link to a list of BNSF coal
> origin/destination codes:
>
> http://www.qstation.org/bnsf/bnsfcoal.html
>
> included in that list are many of the old BN coal
> codes that you can use to "decode" the coal trains
> symbols.
>
>
> Take care,
>
> Mark


Thanks for the info Mark!


Allen

bradleymckay Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> WAF Wrote:
> --------------------------------------------------
> -----
> > Allen, all that alphabet was for mines, the
> > numbers, or at least some of them, how many
> trains
> > orginated from that mine that year,IIRC. Also
> BN
> > was in alpha symbols.. PSH I think was Portland
> > Seattle Houston, later BN196.
> >
> > TAW I think can help more on this.
>
> So, Wes, the SPD was Seattle, Portland, Denver??
>
>
> AM

From what I understand