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Re: WE WILL DELIVER...eventually!
Author: KD7ZST
Date: 06-25-2010 - 17:55
I was a manager at the shop/service track at Hinkle from 1998 to 2003. During that time, I had to deal with numerous waybilled locomotives that lacked alignment control couplers. I was always reminded of the movie "Groundhog Day" whenever one arrived as it seemed that everyone would forget everything there was to know about the previous moves.
The rules stipulated at the time that they were to be placed no less than five cars and no more than ten cars from the rear of the train (with, of course, the dead engine feature cut-in). However, they frequently showed up as the trailing unit in a consist. They eventually would end up in one of two places: at the setout track at the hump or at the roundhouse with the inbound consist. Soon after their arrival, I would receive a call from the MYO on duty asking me to perform an inspection and/or looking for some general guidance on what do with them.
From my own observations, if they were marooned at the hump, they would languish there until the customer raised enough hell as it was something of a mild irritant for the yardmasters to get the trim to come pick it up and place it on the rear of the train. If it made it to the roundhouse, it would also languish there until we (the loco dept) and/or the customer complained enough as the yardmasters/MYOs would just assume build trains than send a trim job to the roundhouse (full of blue lights) to pick it up.
It seems that some things never change.
The rules stipulated at the time that they were to be placed no less than five cars and no more than ten cars from the rear of the train (with, of course, the dead engine feature cut-in). However, they frequently showed up as the trailing unit in a consist. They eventually would end up in one of two places: at the setout track at the hump or at the roundhouse with the inbound consist. Soon after their arrival, I would receive a call from the MYO on duty asking me to perform an inspection and/or looking for some general guidance on what do with them.
From my own observations, if they were marooned at the hump, they would languish there until the customer raised enough hell as it was something of a mild irritant for the yardmasters to get the trim to come pick it up and place it on the rear of the train. If it made it to the roundhouse, it would also languish there until we (the loco dept) and/or the customer complained enough as the yardmasters/MYOs would just assume build trains than send a trim job to the roundhouse (full of blue lights) to pick it up.
It seems that some things never change.
