Great bit of dialogue between NC and Mr. Lafluffer. These rain storms with downed trees have been creating a mess along the entirety of the line and it sounds like it may have been the cause of the train going into emergency and ripping the drawbar out.
Hey John, is it legal to go where you were? I'm trying to find a spot to railfan near that diamond other than the pedestrian bridge. I spent a day up on the bridge on the 13th and met a lot of people I don't want to see again
By "not the right cab signals" are you talking about Pan Am's former system being different than CSX's? Or is the small segment of joint operated track with the P&W between Worcester and Barber Junction the issue?
MBTA, like other northeastern passenger railroads, uses ACSES PTC on the tracks they own, and only certain CSX locomotives have that particular PTC system installed (CSX mostly uses I-ETMS PTC on its own lines). M426/M427 has to go through MBTA territory 3 times (from Ayer to Willow Junction on the MBTA Fitchburg Line, around Lowell, and on the Haverhill Line from south of Ballardsvale to Haverhill), so the leader needs a locomotive with ACSES PTC. Only certain AC4400CW's (in the upper-400 series), SD40-2's, GP40-2's, and SD40E3 #1712 have ACSES, so one of those always leads M426/M427.
I was at the show. The amount of time that these gentlemen spend loading, transporting, assembling and then disassembling these layouts must be really high. They should be thanked for their time.
I’m assuming that because Amhearst is in New England most of the models and modelers would reflect railroads from that region. Still, a little foreign road power is always nice to see.
I've watched several videos and it just doesn't seem like there are nearly as many people than in previous years of course not being there and just trying to judge by videos isn't a precise way to tell...
My son, who was there with the Mohegan Pequot group featured in the first few minutes of this video, said the exact opposite. He told me that the crowds were the largest anyone had ever seen.
