From the south of Portland end of it:

Last night Cascades Talgo #507 (Seattle/Eugene) got through. South of Portland it was running about two hours late. Starlight #14 (LA/Seattle) was about an hour late out of Vancouver, WA and got stuck between slides. It exceeded hours and had to be recrewed. Cascades Talgo #509 (Seattle/Eugene) got as far as Tacoma and wasn't going to be able to go any farther. A bus was called and the driver said it was too dangerous to drive. (don't know what happened to those passengers)

I am in Salem and heard the rest of this happen last night. #507 was following the ZBRLC about two hours late when the the ZBRLC hit a tree somewhere near mp735. (Woodburn area) Continued on. It went in the siding at Renard (mp714 south of Salem) to let #507 around and encountered another tree. The tree sliced into a Schneider trailer on a triple 53 flat. #507 went on to Eugene. The ZBRLC was still at Renard this AM when they proceeded to remove the flat from the train and move it back towards Salem. At noon a large, tracked, back hoe type with a claw was tearing the trailer apart and putting the large rolls of Kraft paper into a dump truck.

I was told by AMTRAK that the BNSF will not allow trains with passengers for 48 hours after mud slides or washouts. (A train I was on was involved with that in the past) That means: The Coast Starlight that made it into Seattle early this AM and should be #11 south will deadhead to Portland with the passengers being bussed. Starlight #14 will be annulled in Portland and bus from there. (I heard it go north this evening) Two Talgo sets are in Portland and #507 and #509 will operate south to Eugene tonight, and north as #500 and #504 tomorrow. It is now 9:00PM and I should have heard #507 and I haven't. The deadhead #11 from Seattle had to be inspected, turned, and cleaned so it is going to be late starting out. I haven't heard it either.

I haven't heard of any washouts or flooding on the UP south of Portland. The are many, many problems with crossing gates and the dispatcher is giving out "X" orders six and eight at a time. Dispatch is losing control of switches intermittantly. My guess is that both of those problems are related to power outages.

I didn't lose power last night but I was among the few in the area that didn't. The AMTRAK station in Salem lost power and couldn't get the baggage cart out because they couldn't get the door up. The Cascades crew helped by spotting the baggage car close to the station and then gave the passengers their luggage right at the train.

jb