| Community Response |
Locomotive Details |
Location/Date of Photo |
 | | Views: 4,950 Favorited: 20 | | Since added on November 20, 2010 | |
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» Alaska Railroad (more..)
» EMD SD70MAC (more..) |
» ARR Mainline - near MP 49
» South of Portage, Alaska, USA (more..)
» November 17, 2010 |
| Locomotive No./Train ID |
Photographer |
» ARR 4322 (more..)
» ARR 182S (more..) |
» Dave Blaze... (more..)
» Contact Photographer · Photographer Profile |
| Remarks & Notes |
| The mid train DPU helpers can be seen framed in the fireman's side window of SD70MAC 4004 which is the second of 3-MACs on the head end of this 10,765 ton loaded coal train. The 74 car train is winding around a 14 degree curve while battling a 3% grade on the single most spectacular section of line on the Alaska Railroad (which is saying a lot for a road consisting of innumerable superlatives). If a train is going to stall on the railroad this is where it will happen, but not today. The rail was clean and dry and the heavy train marched up the grade in notch 8 at a respectable 9 MPH. For decades the ARR doubled this hill, but is now capitalizing on DPU technology and the high-adhesion radial trucks on its modern fleet to single the hill. New this year is an increase in train size to 75 cars with the DPUs cut in behind the 38th head car. Prior to October of this year the trains were kept to 70 cars with the DPU power positioned on the rear. Note: the photographer is a railroad employee with permission to ride and was wearing all required PPE while taking this photograph. |
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Photo Comments (2) |
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