The Dominion of Canada has arrived in Halifax, on CN 120 as mentioned earlier. The above shot by David Tindall through the fence at the Ceres terminal shows the two steam engines parked, waiting for the Atlantic Conveyor to come pick them up next Tuesday September 25 to begin their journey across the Atlantic.
Matt aka Saintjohnrailfan caught the Dominion of Canada on CN 120 en route.
They are headed over to celebrate the 75th anniversary of the Mallard's world steam engine speed record. Here is a nice web site listing all of the festivities.
Thanks to David Tindall, David Othen, Bob Liming and Matt for information, photos and video.
There's a new steam engine in the Maritimes... at least for now. British Railways A4 4-6-2 No. 60008, the Dwight D. Eisenhower, is moving from the AmericanNational Railroad Museum in Green Bay, Wisconsin to the BritishNational Railway Museum in York. Here's a good article on the move.
The engine is moving for the 75th anniversary of the setting of the world speed record by a steam engine, set on July 3 1938. The record was set by another A4 class engine, the Mallard. I believe all the existing A4s are being collected together to commemorate the 75th anniversary. Can you imagine a steam engine going 126 MPH?
Here are a few sightings of the engine's transit to Halifax:
2012/08/11 - through Sarnia, ON on train CN 348.
2012/08/16 21:44 ET - departed St. Lambert, QC on train CN 400.
2012/08/17 20:35 AT - passed McGivney, NB on CN 308.
2012/08/17 night - arrived Moncton, NB on train CN 308.
2012/08/19 morning - arrived Halifax, NS on train CN 120.
Crazeejay2006 caught it on CN 348 in Sarnia. It's near the rear of the train, with the tender on a flatcar followed by the tarped steam engine.
David Othen shot this great video of the train arriving in Halifax, and shunting in the Rockingham yard.
There were supposed to be two steam engines heading over to England. I don't know if and when the other engine is coming, or whether the Dwight D. Eisenhower is going to wait in Halifax for the other engine.
A set of EMD SD80ACe locomotives for export arrived in Halifax on CN 120. These locomotives are destined for Vale's mining operations in Brazil. Vale is a very large mining company and its Brazilian iron ore operations are simply huge.
CN 120 had four CN engines on the head end, followed by two Vale engines on their own wheels, a couple of freight cars, then several Vale engines on flatcars with regular freight cars in between as spacers.
David Othen shot CN 120 coming into Rockingham Yard.
Caleb Wentzell shot the engines in Rockingham yard. The light was great for these shots.
Here's Caleb's closeup of Vale 102.
The locomotives will be loaded on a ship and sent to Brazil to join the rest of the iron ore fleet.
Here are a few recent YouTube videos I saw and wanted to share with you.
Kevin Gaudet posted this video of CN 120 at Memramcook. The train had CN 8949 (shiny new SD70M-2), IC 1036, and CN 2666.
I can't get used to CN 120 having all this non-container junk in the train. CN 120/121 used to be pure container trains, but with the loss of most of the freight trains in the Maritimes, 120 and 121 get to carry the junk. Some of this would have gone on CN 148 and 149 but they do not run any more.
RailFanJon shot an empty coal train growling by on the CP Shuswap subdivision in British Columbia. Lots of good noise from the engines as they throttle up.
VanBilly1 caught two CEMR engines going into the BNSF yard here in Winnipeg. This was a great catch. On Monday, March 14, BNSF had put their engine on the ground (or, as we say it, derailed) around 14:00 and the CEMR engines were coming to help out while BNSF tried to get their engines back on the rails.
CN 120 was late Thursday morning, which gave me the chance to see it. I was traveling from Halifax to Moncton early in the morning and I caught it at Aulac, NB. I didn't have much time to set up so I wasn't able to pan the video camera to follow it, for fear of a very tilted horizon. I did grab a few stills as it went by at 07:27. The power was old friend CN 5756, 2534, 2595, 5675, and GP9 7031.
It was raining pretty hard on Sunday, and I had no intentions of doing any "formal" railfanning. My daughter wanted to go to Cora's for breakfast, and who am I to deny her? The only Cora's I knew of was in Bedford*, so off we went. I went down Barrington then around the Bedford Basin, taking me by Rockingham yard. You have to drive near tracks if you want to see trains!
I saw two GP38s with a string of loaded container cars down by Ceres, and as I approached the CN yard office I saw a string of containers rolling by the Chinese restaurant at the foot of the Kearney Lake Road. I quickly pulled into the CN office parking lot, and within a few minutes CN 120 rolled into view just past 11 AM. They were not on the main line, and in fact they had to stop to reline a switch before proceeding through the yard. CN 2228 and 2645 provided the power.
The reason for their passage through the yard became apparent when CN 4720 and 4722 (the two Geeps I saw earlier) rolled past the yard office on the main line.
I didn't hang around to count cars, nor did I see a DPU unit as I drove past the train, but it certainly could have been there.
Later, I saw VIA 15 roll under the highway at Atkinson as I drove through the pouring rain. Funny - the last time I saw a train there, it was the Veteran Train from November 2005, and it was raining then too!
* There are actually five Cora's in the Halifax area!
Due to the conductor's strike on CN, things seem to be running a bit late. My family and I were in Moncton yesterday (Sunday), and I was hoping to catch VIA 14 before it got to the station. Alas, it was on time and I only saw the tail end of the Ocean as it passed Moncton's West End. I heard that CN 120 would be following it out of the station, so I got a few shots of it waiting at the West End signals at 11:50. Normally CN 120 would be in Halifax before sunrise so things were definitely running late.
120 had SD75 5630 on the head and Dash-8 2451 running elephant-style behind it. They had 56 or 65 cars, all loads.
On Saturday, October 26, 2002 I spent a very enjoyable morning railfanning around Halifax, Nova Scotia with my good friend David Othen.
CN 120
We met at Rockingham Yard and the first train we saw was CN 120, arriving at Rockingham Yard in Halifax at 07:25. We taped it coming around the curve by the Chinese restaurant before moving to the Halifax Intermodal Terminal for its arrival at 07:41.
The train featured SD75I CN 5735, SD40-2 CN 5318 and Dash-8 CN 2424 leading the usual intermodal consist. The video of the train is below.
CN 701
Following that, we raced to Dartmouth to catch gypsum train 701 leaving Wrights Cove with an empty train to take to Milford.
CN 701 had Dash-9 CN 2504 and SD75I CN 5646. We got 701 at a couple of locations on the way to the mines. Here it is at the mines with the National Gypsum switcher.
CN 5646 with the National Gypsum switcher
CN 148
While it was loading, we took a minute to catch CN 148 passing near Milford with SD75s CN 5642 and 5671 leading two CN test cars and an intermodal train.
Back to 701
701 was done at the mines, so we caught him at Windsor Junction on his way back to Dartmouth. It was a good chase in both directions! Here's my video of the day's gypsum trains...
Wrapping Up
We then went to Rockingham to look at the switchers (GP38-2s 4775 and 4724). It's interesting to see the difference in the cabs for these two GP38s.
CN 4775 in Halifax, Nova Scotia
CN 4724 in Halifax, Nova Scotia
Finally, we caught VIA 15 near Rockingham with 6411 and 6427 at 13:06. Apparently I don't have any photos of that online.
The kids and I set out for a little railfanning this morning around 9:00. We went by HIT and Rockingham Yard, and I was surprised to see both empty. I talked with David Othen, and after checking the signals at Millview (dark), we concluded that both 148 and 120 had not arrived.
After a short break to feed the kids, I spoke with David and we headed to the Halifax Ocean Terminals (HOT) to wait for 148. We watched GP38 units 4728 and 4722 push some container flats into HOT at 11:00.
At 11:25 CN 148 came into view, led by CN 5729 (SD75I). It had to stop to change the switch and I got this shot. I took video of 148 rolling by the switcher.
We went to a park for a while, then came back to see VIA 15 leave on time at 12:38, with the same consist I saw yesterday on 14.
Finally, we went to HIT and saw CN 120 pushing its consist at 13:04.
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