Article

2007-01-19 India-Pakistan

Blast suspends train traffic in Balochistan

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Posted by Fred 2007-01-19 00:00|| || Front Page|| [11127 views since 2007-05-07] Top

#1 Thanks Fred for your good taste in train pictures. That's Norfolk & Western 611, one of the last steam passenger engines built in the US, in 1950. It is now on static display in a museum in Roanoke, VA.

Posted by Casey Jones 2007-01-19 00:37|| 2007-01-19 00:37|| Front Page Top

#2 I got to see 611 several times when she was running excursions in the 1980s and 1990s. Magnificent machine.

Posted by Mike 2007-01-19 07:15|| 2007-01-19 07:15|| Front Page Top

#3 Steam pr0n (heavy sigh).

My Great Uncle Max was an engineer on the East Pennsylvania branch of what use to be the Philadelphia and Reading railroad. As a wee lad my Grandmother had made arrangements for Max to stop the train at a crossing in the middle of nowhere to pick me up and ride with him and the crew into Reading on one of the last steam runs.

As all steamheads know, when a steam engine stops, the squeaks and squawks it makes and vents of blowing steam are immense. Much too much in fact for a tiny boy to tolerate. I bolted from the side of the tracks and ran and cowered in the corn field and would not come out. Max waited as long as he could but eventually had to be on his way and left without me.

Of all the mistakes and bad decisions I've made in my life, this one will be the lead on my Dumbass Hall of Fame application. I just don't understand people who say they have no regrets. :(

Posted by GORT 2007-01-19 08:29|| 2007-01-19 08:29|| Front Page Top

#4 Great story GORT.

Posted by Shipman 2007-01-19 11:34|| 2007-01-19 11:34|| Front Page Top

#5 GORT---I felt the same about my grandfather's welding truck in Bakersfield. 5 years old, scared to death, cried like a baby. Oh-but the article was about a blown up train track in Balochistan. Must be free association day. Thanks for the pic, Fred.

Posted by Alaska Paul">Alaska Paul 2007-01-19 11:56|| 2007-01-19 11:56|| Front Page Top

#6 When I was a tad, after we moved to Pennsylvania my Dad used to take me with him back to Kentucky for a week each summer. The Pocahontas ran from Roanoke to Bluefield, so there's a sentimental association.

I believe the last year we went by train was the last year 611 ran.

Posted by Fred 2007-01-19 12:27|| 2007-01-19 12:27|| Front Page Top

#7 Anything mechanical gets my pumped ( OK so maybe that's a badly constructed sentece, from a choice of words POV) Steam locomotives really do it for me. My daily commute takes me past a former Scott's paper 2-6-2 that was retierd in 1951. I often fantasize about firing it back up and see what would happen ( most likely a huge boiler explosion). Diesel-electrics are more efficient, but steam is more romantic ( and manly at the same time)

Posted by USN, Ret. 2007-01-19 14:23|| 2007-01-19 14:23|| Front Page Top

#8 Steam sheemeem, Iva weakness for hummm-jobs.

Posted by Shipman 2007-01-19 17:11|| 2007-01-19 17:11|| Front Page Top

#9 Oh, 1968 Port Jarvis New Jersey, right before the debacle.

Posted by Shipman 2007-01-19 17:12|| 2007-01-19 17:12|| Front Page Top

#10 Would that debacle have been the PRR-NYC Merger?

Posted by USN, Ret. 2007-01-19 17:59|| 2007-01-19 17:59|| Front Page Top

#11 My dad was a yard clerk for the Missouri Pacific. I got to ride from Alexandria, LA, to Monroe, about 100 miles, in the cab of an old 2-8-0. GREAT experience, and yes I was scared. Dad was there with me, so I wasn't TOO scared. LOVE steam. We have several great steam runs here in Colorado, all narrow-gauge. The best, scenery-wise, is the Durango-Silverton run.

People that blow up railroad tracks and trains are just slightly above perverts that blow up schools and kids, in my book.

Posted by Old Patriot">Old Patriot 2007-01-19 21:30|| http://oldpatriot.blogspot.com/]">[http://oldpatriot.blogspot.com/] 2007-01-19 21:30|| Front Page Top

#12 My story's sort of the reverse of yours, guys.

I grew up in the railroad town of Clifton Forge, VA. Widest railroad bridge in the world (at that time, at least) - 14 tracks IIRC - & we were on Hitler's bombing list because so much coal passed through the town.

Anyways, my grandfather was a brake inspector for the C&O (now CSX), and he arranged for my brother and me to climb up in the cab of the first diesel locomotive to come into town (I was about 5 years old). It was a HUGE event; most of the town turned out. I do remember taking the train during the steam locomotive era - there were a number of years before the diesels took over completely. In fact, I remember the Pullman cars, both the private compartments and the not-so-private berths with just curtains for privacy. The most restful, peaceful sleep in the world is to the clickity-clack of train wheels (which I don't think exists in this country anymore - I think most if not all of the rails are welded now).

Interesting story I'll bet no one else here can tell: Women were not allowed in the railroad shops (where my grandfather worked). Presumed bad luck, I guess; no one ever explained it to my satisfaction. They probably had porn pictures on the walls. On one of my grandfather's days off, my brother and I walked with him across town to the top of the long stairs that went down from the street to the shops (Clifton Forge is in the mountains); if I knew the reason he needed to go there, I don't remember it. I think I was about 8 years old, certainly no more than 10.

Anyway, my brother went with him down to the shops, while I had to wait up on the street alone. No, I wasn't scared - it was Clifton Forge, ferchrissakes. What I was was angry at being left out. Again. It seemed to me on more than one occasion growing up in the 1950's that the boys got to do all the interesting things and have all the fun, and the girls got to do needlework and make cocoa.

I have nothing against either needlework or cocoa - I can do both - but I do have something against waiting around politely while others get to do fun or exciting things. I have no doubt this is why, as soon as I got out of school, I started doing things that made my mother's hair turn even whiter: went off to New York for several years to try my hand at show biz; hitchhiked across Western Europe, then lived there for a while; back in the States, became a volunteer firefighter, then move to the volunteer rescue squad. All the stuff that girls weren't supposed to do back then.

Definition of "men's work": It's either fun or it pays well, or both. ;-p

Anyway, back to the topic at hand - #11 OP, I'm witcha on that. There's a special section of Hell for people who blow up trains, where they have to lay track for eternity, only to see it blown up over and over again.

Posted by Barbara Skolaut">Barbara Skolaut 2007-01-19 23:50|| http://ariellestjohndesigns.com/page/15bk1/Home_Page.html]">[http://ariellestjohndesigns.com/page/15bk1/Home_Page.html] 2007-01-19 23:50|| Front Page Top

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