Canadian Railroads > A Folly Lake Meet.

I was on my way to the Wentworth, NS ski hill on Thursday for a social event, and as I passed the east end of Folly Lake siding, noticed that the signals were set up with a clear signal for a westbound train.  With no VIA 15 on a Thursday, this was most likely going to be 407, the manifest freight from Dartmouth.  I could hear something working its way up the hill, and at about 15:20 Dash-9s 2535 and 2558 crept past MP 23 of the Springhill Sub with what appeared to be a very heavy train.  I found out later that it had taken them about 30 minutes to go from MP 17 to 23, the worst part of the grade up Folly Mt.

While I was waiting, the signal had changed from clear to clear-to-stop.  The crew was rather disappointed to see this, but it seems that VIA 14 was already past Oxford Jct. (the next siding), so there wasn't much choice.  The west switch of the siding would not lock up in reverse, so there was some paperwork involved for both trains, but 407's crew assisted by manually throwing the switch for 14 to put them in the siding, and then back again so they could proceed.  It seems the east switch operated as intended, so there was minimal delay to 14, which seemed to be operating on time, as close as I could tell.

GTD

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With the switch at the west end back to normal, 407 was on the move again just before 16:00.

I was planning to stay at the ski hill for 2 nights, but with the freezing rain storm, Friday's event was cancelled, and on the way home to Halifax managed to run into 120 (with the same crew that had taken 407 to Moncton the day before) at East Mines Sta.  120 had IC 2726, CN 5645, IC 2463 and DPU CN 2221 for power, and 444 axles of mostly intermodal traffic for Halifax.

The freezing rain turned to heavy rain Friday night in Halifax, and then the temperature dropped over night, so although I have power, a lot of people in the province don't.  Fortunately, things warmed up enough that the ice fell off the trees before the wind picked up, otherwise things could be even worse here.  Although it`s not shown here, VIA`s westbound Ocean on Friday left Halifax on time despite the weather and was actually slightly early into Moncton.  Final arrival in Montreal this morning was 54 minutes late, but I think Montreal was hit even harder than we were, weather wise.

GTD 

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Great bunch.
JB



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/08/20 11:24 by 3rdswitch.

Mighty cold, but that sure is a sharp paint scheme. Not very complicated, the white diagonal makes it even more distinct.
Stay warm up there.

TCnR Wrote:
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> Mighty cold, but that sure is a sharp paint
> scheme. Not very complicated, the white diagonal
> makes it even more distinct.
> Stay warm up there.

Actually, it looks really cold, but what many people don't realize is that freezing rain (or icing in general) only happens when the temperature is within a few degrees of freezing.  If it's much warmer it's just liquid rain, and much colder it will just be fine powdery snow.  The wind can make it seem much colder, but things were pretty calm when I shot these pictures.

GTD

The shot of 120 heeling into the curve is just beautiful.
Fred

Nice to see the Ocean with its Renaissance Equipment - three locomotives too!

Yes, nice set.  I too enjoy seeing the Ren cars and am always a sucker for a mid DPU.

Andy