Eastern Railroad Discussion > Chasing on the Mississippi Export

Some friends and I spent the weekend in the City of Pascagoula, Mississippi. Only roughly 2 hours from home, but some new territory. We had two simple missions for this trip: Catch the Military train and the Mississippi Export Railway.

Well the first one was a dud for me at least, the train came at night and I was really prepared for it so my shots didn't come out well enough.
The following morning we drove to Moss Point, a quiet little suburb just north of the city. There we scoped out the MSE trackage for some shots and to our surprise, we caught something completely different.

Photo 1&2 are similar stories. CSX 4500, "The Spirit of Cumberland" pulls a rock train up the MSE through Railroad St. There are several cities in the Gulf South that still have busy street running, but none like this, just a couple of feet in either direction were houses.

Photo 3 is from a different point in town. CSX 4500 crosses The Escatawpa River via a swing bridge. We got really lucky on this shot since the conductor had to walk the bridge to make sure it was aligned properly which provided us extra time to set up the shots. The sun was not in our favor today.

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Interesting photos. I gather CSX operates this railroad now?

Regards, Jim Evans

nice work. well done

No, it's still operated by the MSE, however CSX does use it to connect to CN.

Great series from a seldom photographed area,
I enjoyed.
Alan

Great shots there sir. I have never seen shots from down there before. What does MSE use for power? GRS

If you wanna see great street running and a swing bridge close by then head up to Gadsden, Alabama and railfan the ATN railroad. They still blow their horns for the street running road intersections. About a 100 yards south of that is the old L&N swing bridge