Railfanning 12/1 and 12/10/2011

Hi, Friend Rudy Volin and I spent 2 beautiful days railfanning on 12/1 and 12/10.  A late start on 12/1 got us to Point of Rocks, MD a little before noon.  There was a large tie gang spread out along Track 1.

About 12:15 PM a late running Capital Limited with friend Brian Paulus at the throttle came through.

Work train D023 followed the Capital about 45 minutes later on Track 1.  It went only a block or two east of the station and then went to work picking up old ties.

D023 was followed by D025 which went up the Old Main Line a short distance before stopping to pick up ties.

Once D025 had cleared the interlocking east of Point of Rocks on the Old Main Line light helper set B801 came west.

Finally, by the last light of day the Frederick Local headed out the Old Main Line.

Saturday, 12/10 dawned with some clouds.  We decided to head to Brunswick, MD as there was a shot there we had seen on 12/1 and not shot before.  We followed the tracks as best we could but missed an eastbound near Gaithersburg, MD.  We wound up in Point of Rocks where we got our first train, U848.  Ten seconds earlier this shot was in shadow.  Occasionally things work out!

Moving on to Brunswick we found a signal suspension in progress as signal crews worked to cut over control of the area from East Brunswick (the eastern end of the yard) to Weaverton, MD from WB tower to the Jacksonville, FL dispatcher.  During the morning normally eastbound Tracks 2 and 4 were out of service allowing this shot of eastbound coal train U813 on normally westbound track 1.  This was the location we had come to shoot although we did not expect to get an eastbound here.

We then drove over to the 4 runner where a work train was parked.  This train would leave in early afternoon when the eastbound tracks opened.

Amtrak's Capital Limited followed the U813 abut 45 minutes later.

Since it sounded like it would be quiet for awhile on CSX we decided to head over to Shenandoah Junction, WV.  With the sun at its Zenith NS #227 went north and we just watched.  However, #16T was following #227 and in the meantime we heard U884 coming east so we went to the overpass just west of Bardane, WV.

We got back to Shenandoah Junction just as #16T approached the north end of the siding.

We then returned to Brunswick to catch Q249 heading west at the trackside houses we wanted to photograph.

The next train up was supposed to be Q217, however, it ran through a red signal at East Brunswick and the dispatcher held it just west of that signal.  There was nothing else westbound that was close so we called it an early day and headed for home.  I hope you enjoyed the photos.