One of my son’s classes happens to have him sitting right next to a window. That window happens to be about 50 or so yards in plain view of a Northfolk Southern line. Everyday he gets to see the rock quarry train go by, but today he saw something different. He said a train came by that had a regular geep of sorts in front, then right behind that, appeared to be the same kind of geep, only instead of black and white, it was red and white with all the Northfolk Southern markings. He said both engines were painted with the new running horse logo, just that number two was red and white. Here’s where it get’s even better. Third and last in line he said is what appeared to be a modified combine?!?!?!? He said it was also red and white with the same N/S markings and that it had “RESEARCH” stenciled in big white letters, and had two large red revolving lights on top? Now I know passenger service between Atlanta and Savannah has been a hot topic the last few years, and I’m sure it’ll be a hot button issue in The Georgia General Assembly next year. But what the heck did my son see?
Possibly a Mow??? I don’t know
I’d guess that it was a maintainence of way train. Did it have a lot of orange NS gondolas?
Nope. All it consisted of were the three described. He knows MOW stuff, and he said it didn’t have those markings. Just “RESEARCH” in big letters.
Ah, perhaps it was one of NS’s track geometry trains. The combine type car you said your son saw makes much more sense if it was a geometry train. I believe the red and white locomotive your son saw was their load test/experiment/research locomotive. If it was, then it’s not really a locomotive, just a shell with equipment and weight inside, which would explain the Geep in front.
That makes sense, especially since passenger service is probably going to be revived. That’s the line it would run on, too.
Is this it?
Wow, that looks pretty nice,… Track geometry train if you ask me. Checking out the track to see if it needs replacing/fixing.
I have a picture of the either the car in question or a similar one, shot in Columbus Ga several years ago. I looked but could not find it tonight. It was unloading the crew when I came upon it. Appers to be a track inspection car. Phil
TZ, that is what I call great service. Ain’t this forum great. I wasn’t even interested until I saw the pic. That is one interesting consist. Thanks
Yes, TZ, he says that’s it. Thanks a lot.
On the NS roster it is listed as a AAR type M350 and AAR class of MS (Scale car - cars used to test railroad track scale). What is interesting is that all the other cars in the NS roster of M350 class MS, clearly state in the description that they are “Scale Test Car”; however, this one just says “Other/not listed”. To me that means it isn’t just another scale test car but something a little more special. I am guessing that there are “real time” monitoring panels in the passenger car it is hooked to all the time. Possibly the weight of the old SD frame (or maybe they’ve loaded it with more weight) on 6 axle trucks makes a difference from the normal scale test cars like these:
or
P.S. Everyone needs to thank “batman” for taking the pics of #34. I just researched them out of the railroad picture archives library. Ditto to the respective authors for the two above too.
How bout a big thanks to everyone involved?