Two Silver Service Stories

[battalion51]

Both from the Trains.com newswire for Today (November 3, 2005)

Locomotive on Amtrak Silver Meteor catches fire
CRESCENT CITY, Fla. – Amtrak’s northbound Silver Meteor, bound from Orlando to New York, was delayed more than 3 hours when a diesel fuel leak caused a fire in its locomotive Wednesday afternoon on CSX near Crescent City, according to a story in the Palatka (Fla.) Daily News. Crescent City is 80 miles south of Jacksonville.

Train No. 98 was met by local fire departments from Crescent City, Pomona Park, and Georgetown, Fla. There were no injuries. The locomotive crew was evaluated for possible smoke inhalation but did not require medical treatment.

“Some flames were visible coming from the engine when we arrived, and it took about 30 minutes to get it under control,” said firefighter Lt. Keith Fleetwood. “It took several hours for Amtrak to get a second engine in from Sanford.” Sanford is just north of Orlando.

Georgetown and Pomona Park volunteer fire departments provided water and ice for the passengers, who did not disembark. The train arrived at Jacksonville 3 hours, 14 minutes late.

The Silver Meteor normally runs between Miami and New York, but it has been terminating in Orlando due to damage to CSX track to the south caused by Hurricane Wilma.

CSX trackwork may detour Amtrak Palmetto

WASHINGTON — Amtrak’s northbound Palmetto, train No. 90, which runs from Savannah, Ga., to New York, is anticipated to detour from Florence, S.C., to Selma, N.C., for four days, Nov. 14-17, because of trackwork being planned for that period in North Carolina by CSX on the train’s normal route, Trains magazine has learned from Amtrak sources. Missed station stops between Florence and Rocky Mount, N.C., will be covered by a bus. The southbound Palmetto, train 89, will not be affected.

The train will veer from its normal route, the CSX “A Line,” just south of Dillon, S.C., onto CSX’s freight-only Andrews Subdivision, a former Seaboard Air Line route between Charleston, S.C., and Hamlet, N.C. At Hamlet, the train will access the Amtrak Silver Star route, CSX’s Aberdeen Sub, to Cary, N.C., and then Norfolk Southern through Raleigh to Selma, before rejoining its normal route.

The northbound Palmetto is expected to lose 2 hours or more going via the detour, and for those 4 days, will depart Savannah and all stops through Florence, S.C., 1 hour in advance of the published scheduled times. The Andrews Subdivision has been used occasionally in the past as an alternate route by Amtrak, owing to either trackwork or line service disruptions, for the Palmetto and/or the New York-Florida trains.

There's a curiosity with each story. On the Meteor that makes two Engine fires Amtrak's had in two weeks. I'm not saying these were intentional, but it is a little odd. Secondly for the Palmetto story, I'm surprised by the route it's taking. The only reasoning I can come up with for the route is to keep T&E online out of FLO to SAV. But still this is going to require either pilots or folks to get qualified on new territory, both seem highly unnecessary. But if you're into rare trackage, buy your tickets!

 

[Sam Damon]

Having two engine fires in two weeks does raise the ol' eyebrows.

Any indication on what's causing them? Lack of preventive maintenance, fur instance?

 

[Miami Joe]

Only an assumption, but Amtrak released a bulletin about 2 months ago concerning defective braided steel fuel lines. Each loco was to be inspected during inspection and the defective lines could be identified by the date on the ID tag mounted on the line.

With all the recent changes after Wilma, I wonder if these engines were part of Hialeah's current loco rotation, swapped with Sanford's AT engines or swapped in from another facility.

Hialeah hasn't had an engine fire in years!

With the changes in the train schedule, the loco tech's work schedules at Hialeah were changed from daylight hours to nighttime hours! :unsure: The techs were guys who only worked locos for the last 10 yrs and highly qualified! Only 1 stayed as a tech and the new guys have had little training!

So, anything is possible!

MJ B)

 

[Guest_Amtrak OBS Employee]

There's a curiosity with each story. On the Meteor that makes two Engine fires Amtrak's had in two weeks. I'm not saying these were intentional, but it is a little odd. Secondly for the Palmetto story, I'm surprised by the route it's taking. The only reasoning I can come up with for the route is to keep T&E online out of FLO to SAV. But still this is going to require either pilots or folks to get qualified on new territory, both seem highly unnecessary. But if you're into rare trackage, buy your tickets!

Bat51, back in the summer before they returned this train to its present operation, we had it as our train out of the MIA and JAX OBS crewbases. We had to reroute for almost two months on the same named route in this case, and on #P090 only. We had CSX engineers pilot us over the route for about a week then NS engineer at Cary. We had a FLO based Amtrak conductor (who was qualified on that freight territory as well) who accompanied the regular FLO crews each day the train rerouted on Mon- Thurs. That was all he was assigned to do during that period before he returned to his regular job on the "Meteor." But we had CSX and NS engineers who piloted the train at that time for at least the first week. It is an interesting route provided the track speeds are around 30 mph between DIL and HAM. The same conductor was with us, but again I believe we had CSX engineerrs and changed to NS engineers at Cary (to operate over the State owned NS route) until they got an Amtrak engineer qualified over that reroute area about a week later.

I wouldn't say it is unnecessary, though. It actually makes more sense being the train is gonna be able to operate its normal route southbound as it beats canceling the train all together! Which would you rather have if you were traveling? The train operate an extended reroute if your going the whole way, dealing with a short bus ride to meet the train at WLN or RMT, or to be told your train isn't running at all! OBS....

 

[trainboy325]

At least Amtrak will run the train. The last time CSX had track work on the "A-line" in North Carolina and Virginia, the company ran a "wonderful" bus bridge between RMT and RVR and leaving PTB trainless for a few weeks.

It is fun though to take a train on a reroute just to watch the T&E operations by freight railroad employees.