Sunset Limited #1 (6)

[Michael061282]

A friend of mine is on the Westbound Sunset Limited that left New Orleans on Monday. They left San Antonio yesterday and made it as far as Uvalde, TX when the big UP Freight derailment near Del Rio happened. They waited a few hours on site before being towed back to San Antonio, where they idled for over 24 hours. Passengers were given the option of being bustituted or staying with the train, most took the bus option, a few, including my fiend and his companion stayed with the train. He just texted me said they're in Alpine, TX for a crew smoke break. Even though they no longer show up on the Amtrak Status map, they're running about 33 hours behind time and are only about 11 hours head of today's #1 which just departed Houston.

On a side note.. I wonder what equipment today's #2 out of LA is using.

 

[Ocala Mike]

Good thing there's not daily service. Highly embarassing to get "lapped" by the next day's train!

:giggle: :giggle: :giggle: :giggle: :giggle:

 

[John Bobinyec]

Even though they no longer show up on the Amtrak Status map, ...

Amtrak reactivated the train in its reservations system, so I was able to put it back on the map.

jb

 

[Michael061282]

now they're "stuck" in Maricopa for "at least two hours". I didn't ask why, I don't think it really matters anymore LOL

 

[George Harris]

Good thing there's not daily service. Highly embarassing to get "lapped" by the next day's train!

Had that happen once on a Seattle to Tokyo flight. Got to sit there and watch the next day flight back up from the gate while the plane we were supposed to be on was doing though the second round of mechanical difficulties. Went through two load ups and back up from the gate before the rail one, something like 30 hours late, followed by a night on the airline in Tokyo due to no available onward flight. About 1994.

 

[NY Penn]

It seems Julie wasn't programmed for such delays. She says 'the train departed 34 hours and point missing underscore 43 minutes late'.

John B: Would it be possible to keep a record of such late trains forever, instead of them being deleted after two years? And maybe even have a directory?

 

[Swadian Hardcore]

Good thing there's not daily service. Highly embarassing to get "lapped" by the next day's train!

:giggle: :giggle: :giggle: :giggle: :giggle:

The CZ that left Emeryville last Thursday arrived into Chicago 15:11 late on Sunday, the next CZ arrived the same day. That was less that nine hours apart.

 

[John Bobinyec]

John B: Would it be possible to keep a record of such late trains forever, instead of them being deleted after two years? And maybe even have a directory?

I keep the current year and the prior year in a format ready to pull up. Years prior to that are in zip files. See http://www.dixielandsoftware.com/Amtrak/status/StatusPages/

John B

 

[Michael061282]

according to the Txt msg I just got, they just arrived in LA right on 8:00pm PT. they may be 35 1/2ish hours late but they made it LOL

 

[Phil S]

according to the Txt msg I just got, they just arrived in LA right on 8:00pm PT. they may be 35 1/2ish hours late but they made it LOL

Yup, I'd love to know if this is an Amtrak record. Or just hear anecdotes, even pre-Amtrak, of trains more than 24 hrs late. I imagine in the very old days, trains got delayed even 2 days, in flooding or the Sierra or Rockies snows. What a nightmare though, this #1(6), for pax and crew, though if I were in a sleeper and food were available, and I wasn;t trying to make sleeper connections, and I had lots to read, you know, I might really enjoy it.

 

[AlanB]

according to the Txt msg I just got, they just arrived in LA right on 8:00pm PT. they may be 35 1/2ish hours late but they made it LOL

Yup, I'd love to know if this is an Amtrak record. Or just hear anecdotes, even pre-Amtrak, of trains more than 24 hrs late. I imagine in the very old days, trains got delayed even 2 days, in flooding or the Sierra or Rockies snows. What a nightmare though, this #1(6), for pax and crew, though if I were in a sleeper and food were available, and I wasn;t trying to make sleeper connections, and I had lots to read, you know, I might really enjoy it.

Definitely not a record! Back in the UP meltdown days, and prior to the 10-1/2 hours of padding that was dropped into the Sunset's schedule there were several cases of the Sunset being 2 days late and more. More than once the train was terminated in New Orleans just so that they could turn in there and try to get back on time going west. They needed that consist in order to do that.

 

[Michael061282]

in an email from my friend, the 20 or so passengers that didn't take the bus option were upgraded to sleepers for the rest of the trip. The coaches were closed off and cleaned for a quick turnaround in LA. A nice gesture by Amtrak I think.