Here's Ivan!

Trains Magazine General Discussion
1

Hurricane Ivan is being projected to make landfall between the Florida Panhandle and eastern Louisiana on Thursday Morning. NS is already making preparations as is CSX which literally runs along the coast. Haven’t heard much on KCS as yet. Evacuations are moving virtually everyone south of I-10 to higher ground along the entire area.

Word from the Short Line Meeting in Lexington, KY indicated greatly reduced railroad attendance as folks headed home to their RRs or skipped the meeting entirely.

LC

2

Well you can only do so much when the land is at or below sea level.
hope everyone stays safe
Joe

3

Guess a body shouldn’t plan on taking the “Sunset” for a few days…

4

Here is the curent KCS Service Advisory:

Hurricane Ivan has reached the Gulf Coast region, bringing high winds and flooding and affecting The Kansas City Southern Railway Company’s (KCSR) operations in Gulfport, Miss. and New Orleans, La. Voluntary evacuations have been ordered. For the safety of our employees, KCSR operations at Gulfport and New Orleans have been closed.

No traffic is moving to or from these areas and is instead being routed around these areas or staged on line of road. Track inspections will be made and any damages will be repaired promptly. As soon as severe weather subsides and it is safe to continue operations, KCSR will notify its customers and service will be fully restored.

For more specific information regarding your shipments, please contact the Customer Service Center at 800-GO-TO-KCS.

5

IVAN THE TERRIBLE!

6

You hear several stories discussing the problems with evacuations, etc. I am surprised railroads are not used to help this process along.

Gabe

7

Good point. An excellent opportunity missed.

But I guess people do want to take the car that way they have something left over. Stuff as much as your life into the car as possible.

8

Most lines are already closed. In any event, there is really no capacity to haul large numbers of passengers by rail in that area. No passenger cars, locomotives, etc. Perhaps if this were 50 years ago the situation would be much different…

LC

9

From NS:

Service Alert
Hurricane Ivan
September 14, 2004

A hurricane watch remains posted from Morgan City, La., to St. Marks, Fla., and extends inland over southeast Alabama and southwest Georgia. Conditions along the north-central and northeastern Gulf Coast will deteriorate rapidly late tomorrow as Ivan approaches.

Norfolk Southern operations in the New Orleans and Mobile areas will be curtailed to ensure the safety of our customers and employees for the duration of the storm.

Customers in the area seeking information about service in this area should contact Central Yard Operations at (800)898-4296.

For information on specific shipments, please contact the National Customer Service Center (800) 635-5768.

10

From CSX:

Service Bulletin – Hurricane Ivan
September 15, 2004

Hurricane Ivan continues to advance toward the Gulf Coast, with projected landfall near Mobile, Ala., late Wednesday, Sept. 15, or early Thursday morning, Sept. 16. Evacuations have been under way in coastal regions along the Florida Panhandle and in low-lying areas in coastal Alabama, Mississippi and Louisiana, including the cities of New Orleans and Mobile. New Orleans floodgates were closed at 8 p.m. Tuesday, Sept. 14, suspending interchange traffic.

Service for intermodal, automotive, and boxcar traffic, excluding building materials, has been discontinued between New Orleans, La., and Tallahassee Fla., including Montgomery and Flomaton, Ala., and will resume as the safety of the network is assured. Interchange traffic is being diverted to locations away from the projected path of the storm.

Amtrak service between Orlando and New Orleans has been suspended through the end of the week.

Ballast trains are currently staged at various locations from Hamlet, N.C., to Mobile and throughout key points in Georgia. Generators, chain saws and other equipment have been staged throughout these locations, and private contractors are on call to help with removal of debris and restoration of CSXT lines in the aftermath of the storm.

Signal teams began to remove and secure highway rail crossing gates late Tuesday, and will complete that process today along Hurricane Ivan’s projected path.

All precautions will be taken to ensure the safety of our employees, customers, and the public with minimum delay to shipments as we continue to monitor the progress of this storm.

For more information, customers can call their local CSX representatives or the CSX Customer Service Center at 877-SHIP CSX (877-744-7279).

11

LC,

After the storm passes through (and the rail lines have been inspected), do the gates have to be re-attached before they allow rail traffic to run? Or are reduced-speed runs permitted…

MP

12

While I think you could technically put in stop and flag orders for all the crossings, as a practical matter I would think that the maintainers would reinstall the crossing arms, reserving stop and flag for those locations where there was damage to the crossing protection that couldn’t be easily repaired immediately. Disclaimer: I am not a C&S guy and have only my own observations to rely upon in this context.

LC

13

Poor people of New Orleans. Because the city is below sea level, if it hits than there will be very bad flooding. Thease folk really need our prayers.

14

IH10 westbound from New Orleans to Houston is one solid parking lot…transit times from Sidell, LA. to Beaumont, Tx. in the 5 to 6 hour range, New Orleans to Houston over 15 hours according to one driver seen on the local news this morning.

The Red Cross has set up shelters for evacues in Baytown and Houston.
Cup o’ hot, a cot, and a meal.

I have driven from Houston to New Orleans in 6 hours, including stoping to eat along the way…
Have no idea what the freeways/highways around Mississippi are like, but pity those who got a late start…
Ed

15

With the closing of the flood gate, none of the lines to New Orleans are open. At best, throwing every operable passenger car that could have been dug up, running extra trains, etc., might have helped maybe a couple of thousand people. Tens of thousands have left town.

Hopefully, this will come out less than the worst.

Jay

16

Something was done by Amtrak to help out. See the Newswire. They got the gate used by the City of New Orleans held open and sent it north with the Cresent equipment and a load of 700 passengers. Not bad for a train that maybe carries 200 on a typical day.

Jay

17

I remember seeing in an issue of Trains from 1992 after Andrew, the CSX went down the line with a train of flat cars picking up any and every spare piece of heavy equipment that belonged to the railroad or would be volunteered for the cleanup and rescue effots in Florida. A nice gesture all in the name of southern hospitality.

Ivan is sending a direct hit to my family’s vacation spot which is Gulf Shores/Orange Beach, Alabama…I hope everyone there stays out of harm’s way…er I mean…I hope there is nobody there!

18

Norfolk Southern Service Alert

Update: Hurricane Ivan

September 16, 2004

As Hurricane Ivan moves northward, Norfolk Southern will be working to
restore service in the aftermath of the storm as conditions permit.

Ivan will continue to roar onshore this morning and afternoon, though
it will weaken over land with time. Significant rainfall will continue
to move northward across the Southeast over the next several days. A
looming threat will be the heavy rainfall across the southern
Appalachians through the weekend. Significant flooding is possible
across the mountainous areas of Tennessee and the western Carolinas as
more than a foot of rain is likely for some areas.

Customers in the area seeking information about service in this area
should contact Central Yard Operations at (800)898-4296.

For information on specific shipments, please contact the National
Customer Service Center (800) 635-5768.

Norfolk Southern Corporation
www.nscorp.com

19

Any reports of derailments or railcars being flipped with the gusty winds?

20

None as yet, but most roads in LA, MS and AL remain closed so little damage evaluation has taken place yet. Also, with the number of tornadoes around and predicted high water, some railroad damage is inevitable.

LC