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Re: Modoc Northern Officially Gone-After the dust settled
Author: JoeBloe
Date: 05-24-2015 - 10:19
After a number of years, there are a number of points of that have surfaced regarding Modoc Northern:
1. Most of the covered hoppers that derailed were of a type known by UP and the FRA to have center plate interference (CPI), that reduces the ability of the trucks on these railcars to turn in curves...leading to derailments. UP, instead of taking blame, simply decided to hide the problems with these railcars and continue to defer maintenance on them.
2. There was a vindictive rift between Don Blansett's Utah Central Railroad (a highly profitable one) and Modoc Northern after his ex-wife won UCRY in their divorce. She was very close to some key Union Pacific officials, to which she fed false and misleading information. The result is UP ran with that false and misleading information and did what they did.
3. The county failed to support MN primarily due to its own misunderstanding of the railroad industry and concept of efficient railroad operations. Specifically, one customer thought a specific type of locomotive was "too heavy" for the piece of track in question, when in fact Modoc proved it wasn't...and offending a customer who never liked to be proved wrong...and causing that customer to push MN out through the county board.
4. Western Rail providing very poorly performing SD9 locomotives, causing operational issues.
5. UCRY was supposed to provide back office support to MN, but never did due to the rift caused by his ex-wife.
6. If MN under Don Blansett received the support by the government that Frontier Rail did, MN would be a going concern still. UP even offered up carloads of ties that should have been earmarked for MN.
As a side note, I have heard rumors the new operator has or is installing some new ties...but claiming they are of higher grade that is being installed...and pocketing the difference in price as pure profit.
Also as a side note, at least one of the GE's are still held by the trustee in the bankruptcy...and the IRS decided the GE is still Don Blansett's locomotive...even after all of these years.
1. Most of the covered hoppers that derailed were of a type known by UP and the FRA to have center plate interference (CPI), that reduces the ability of the trucks on these railcars to turn in curves...leading to derailments. UP, instead of taking blame, simply decided to hide the problems with these railcars and continue to defer maintenance on them.
2. There was a vindictive rift between Don Blansett's Utah Central Railroad (a highly profitable one) and Modoc Northern after his ex-wife won UCRY in their divorce. She was very close to some key Union Pacific officials, to which she fed false and misleading information. The result is UP ran with that false and misleading information and did what they did.
3. The county failed to support MN primarily due to its own misunderstanding of the railroad industry and concept of efficient railroad operations. Specifically, one customer thought a specific type of locomotive was "too heavy" for the piece of track in question, when in fact Modoc proved it wasn't...and offending a customer who never liked to be proved wrong...and causing that customer to push MN out through the county board.
4. Western Rail providing very poorly performing SD9 locomotives, causing operational issues.
5. UCRY was supposed to provide back office support to MN, but never did due to the rift caused by his ex-wife.
6. If MN under Don Blansett received the support by the government that Frontier Rail did, MN would be a going concern still. UP even offered up carloads of ties that should have been earmarked for MN.
As a side note, I have heard rumors the new operator has or is installing some new ties...but claiming they are of higher grade that is being installed...and pocketing the difference in price as pure profit.
Also as a side note, at least one of the GE's are still held by the trustee in the bankruptcy...and the IRS decided the GE is still Don Blansett's locomotive...even after all of these years.
