Railroaders' Nostalgia > Cellular capers

Wrote about this many years ago in some RR magazine, so forgive me if it seems like a repeat.   Right after cell phones became in common use, before all the rules we have about them today, one engineer I knew found a new use for his.   He forgot about a slow order and so set too much air and snapped his long train in two with the broken knuckle about 80 cars back.   The caboose was long gone, so it was just him and the conductor on the head end.   He knew the time required to fix the train would draw  unwanted attention to his predicament, but, he was in a city and had his cell phone with him.   He quickly finds the number of the local taxi company, calls them and tells them where the lead locomotive is at.   The taxi arrives, picks up the conductor and the new knuckle and heads to the rear end of the train.  Meantime, the engineer tells the dispatcher that he has had an "undesired emergency" and they would be moving again soon.   The conductor fixes the break, returns to the engine and the engineer gladly pays the taxi fare.    Thereafter, the engineer was always sure to have a charged cell phone with him.

That was probably back when they had those early bag phones with a battery.

Todd Clark
Canyon Country, CA
Trainorders.com

They were also used to call ahead for pizza.

Posted from Android

Yeah, some of the pizza places knew just where to go like at Edgerton, Ks. as they had done it before.

An engineer in Augusta, GA made a map of the rr with switch locations. He would pre-pay an account at Dominos and a Chinese Resturant, and several others between Augusta and Spartenburg. He would call ahead and have them leave the order at a switch.

smart!

Dalhart TX the delivery guy drove off and called" there's no house there!" I said it's the train . "It is?"
Nice hot meal going home.