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Eastern Railroad Discussion > The Hunt For NS 1072...

Yesterday I headed to the Capital Region near Albany, NY in hopes of catching NS 1072 leading on the old D&H....

After hours of confusion, driving, and close monitering of the radio, we finally were able to catch him We arrived at Mechanicville, NY (CPF-468 on the old D&H Mainline) at 0900... Mechanicville is where the CP owned D&H splits, with one branch heading south as the CP Colonie Sub to Albany, and the other branch heading to Massachusetts as the Pan Am Southern (PAS). Traffic on the PAS side consists of 6 NS freights, 2 Pan Am freights, and an occasional Unit train. Traffic on CP Albany consists of the daily D45 turn, and as needed ethanol and grain trains.  

On this day, NS 1072 (the Illinois Terminal) Heritage Unit was leading train NS 11R (East Deerfield, MA (PAS) - Binghamton, NY). Upon arrival in Mechanicville, were able to see a south/westbound manifest train tied down in the yard, but we couldn’t see the power. However, the radio soon confirmed this was 11R. We learned he would be picking up an engine in the yard at Mechanicville, and to do that he had to come engines light out of the yard and reverse back in. To catch this move, we headed to CPF-470 at Coons Crossing Rd. We arrived just in time to see him pulling south of the switch (with the third unit picked up)... with a black horsehead leader... Confused & Disappointed at first, we soon learned that there was ANOTHER 11R stopped behind this one waiting for it to clear the yard. This one had been yesterday’s train and due to issues on the D&H was tied down in the yard for the night... So, with hopes of seeing 1072 now restored, we headed back to town for TODAYS 11R.  After about 15 minutes, crossing gates began to go down for 11R... however as he blew the horn around the curve, it was clear this was not NS 1072s K5LLA, it was something else... this train ended up having NS 7025 and 8051 (Image 2) the two units that had been with 1072 on the inbound 16R. Somewhere enroute the 1072 had been cut off... didn’t have much time to try and figure it out though as CP D45 (Saratoga Springs, NY - Albany, NY Turn) was coming north about 30 seconds behind 11R on the other track. Three ECOs provided power. (Image 3) 

After this we were still trying to figure out what happened to 1072 when we received a tip that 23K (Ayer, MA - Chicago, IL) was tied down at CPF-466 a mile north of town. We figured it was worth a look... We pulled up and to our surprise, there was NS 1072 as the lead locomotive! (Image 4 & 5) It turns out 23K hit a tree on the PAS the previous night causing it to need a new leader. 11R donated it’s leader to the 23K... So, after all that confusion, it was a mile away the whole time! We just had to look in the right place... 

Later in the day we caught him again at Mohawk yard, along with some CSX action (Q234 is pictured at Auto-24 on the Selkirk Branch, Image 6) Thanks for stopping by! 



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 11/12/18 12:53 by RiverLineProductions.

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Images 4, 5, and 6

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