Ghost Drag - [Summer Solstice 2015 +7 Series] - Purchased by the Pacific Imperial Railway (aka PIR) the successor in interest to the Carrizo Gorge Railway, these three former CSX GP40-2's sit rotting away in the sun on the end of the Desert Line at Plaster City California. The white five gallon bucket behind the fuel tank on the leading unit, is there to catch the diesel fuel that is slowly leaking out of the tank and soaking the timbers of the small trestle below. Word has it, that these three GP-40's are essentially useless to the PIR because they are grossly under-powered for their intended purpose of pulling double stacked well cars through the gorge to Division on the Mexican border just South and West of Jacumba. Currently, the PIR is involved in a number of management and money problems, the most recent being their newest president (they change like the seasons) is in trouble with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Interestingly enough, a year ago these units were tied down about a 1/2 mile east of their current position and they had to be moved when the UP (the railroad that brought the units to Plaster City) told the PIR guys to get their train off the UP track. Additionally, rumor has it that the units remain unpaid for by the PIR and the former owners are not as of yet, able or interested in going through the grief and expense of reclaiming them from Plaster City. A noted observation from a year ago in 2014, it appears that when the units were moved off the UP track, they were operated a few miles westward where they grabbed four derelict box cars from a string of about 20 sitting on a siding closer to Interstate 8. As to why the operators who moved the three units needed the box cars brought down to Plaster City, who knows. Perhaps it was to have some extra axles to tie down the train because things in the desert are likely to move by themselves in the night (the mind set after the Dubber's Spur incident) or perhaps the PIR guys felt it was necessary to create the illusion that a railroad is actually working out there, and this was a train that was just tied down after a day of switching. It makes one wonder.....
