Bad weather stories

Nice story, but it went right over my head.  What did I miss ?

Dan Padova posted:

Nice story, but it went right over my head.  What did I miss ?

The tornado, apparently.  ;-)  If you've ever been outside in the general vicinity of one, even the best rain suit isn't going to keep you dry.  

Reminds me of my first (inadvertent) experience with solo instrument flying.   Pattern altitude was 2000 feet, ceiling was a ragged 1500 feet.  I found myself in pea soup, kept one eye on the artificial horizon and gently eased the Cessna down to where the air was clear(er, this being the LA basin in the early 80s)...  

Mitch 

Rob, as someone from the Ozarks who also spent seven years living in Kansas, I caught it right away.  No stories here, but I would be delighted if you shared your stories often!  The ol' Frisco doesn't get enough attention!

Ship IT on the Frisco!

Don't think any of us railroader's here can top that one.

As for me, I think I'll stand on the sideline and watch.

Andre

I second Andre's comment.   Wow! 

I love that book; one of my favorites!

Dan Padova posted:

Nice story, but it went right over my head.  What did I miss ?

Hey Dan,

I have this condition where I understand myself perfectly while everyone else is trying to make sense of my statement. (Just ask my wife).

palallin posted:

I love that book; one of my favorites!

Out of curiousity I Googled "stonington causeway railroad hurricane" and came up with an excerpt from "The Great Hurricane of 1938" that retells this story in a bit more detail.

A harrowing tale, indeed

---PCJ

When I was hired as a Fireman by Santa Fe, there was a 17-year gap in seniority between myself and the man four numbers above me.  As a result of that and the hiring of a number of men junior to me, I was able to hold road freight assignments at San Bernardino after less than a year.  The railroad had not hired me for charity purposes.  A change in the Railroad Retirement system was going to allow earlier retirement, and Santa Fe saw that they did not have enough Firemen to promote to Engineer, which then required three years of road service.

So, I frequently worked the Wilmington Turns, which went to Los Angeles Harbor and returned immediately, and the SDX/SBX, a daily pair of trains from San Bernardino to San Diego and return.  These trains frequently encountered thick coastal fog during part of the trip, at any time of the year, and it was a nightly occurrence in spring and fall.  As a result of Engineers who were willing to help me learn to run an engine, I got experience running in fog and not getting lost.

I was holding a regular assignment on the SDX/SBX with an Engineer who had seniority dating to 1936 -- it took as much Engineer seniority to hold that assignment as it did for passenger service  -- when he went on vacation and another 1936 Engineer named Joe Sutton filled the vacancy.  Sutton was a friendly fellow in his late 50s with a much younger wife and young children, and was often not well-rested when he came to work.  He was always willing to let a Fireman run the engine for him so that he could get some rest.  About halfway to San Diego, he offered to trade seats with me and we arrived in San Diego at dusk.  The SBX was made up and ready, so, while a switcher handled our waycar, we changed ends on the locomotive consist and tacked it onto our train.  "Well, young man, ya wanna take her home?" asked Sutton.  I had no objection to that and we were out of San Diego with enough time to make the trip as long as we moved right along.

The head end Brakeman went immediately to the second locomotive (which meant he was going to sleep), and Sutton, in the Fireman's seat was "out" before we hit Old Town.  About 45 minutes later he came to, and realized that we were in pea soup fog.  He sat upright and asked where we were.  "By Solana Beach two minutes ago, Joe," I replied.  He was still little edgy about being in the fog with a Fireman with whom he had only worked a couple of trips.  "How fast are we going?" Sutton wanted to know.  "Sixty," was the reply as I dimmed the headlight just before a block signal appeared out of the gloom and whizzed past.  "Oh, fine, fine, young man.  Just let me know if you need anything," said Sutton, as he drifted back to sleep.  

All he cared about was that we were making the full authorized speed limit in the fog.

While at Fort Sill, during basic training, we were on the North Range for rifle qualifications. We learned at this time , we were to do a road march back to the barracks, which didn't make us happy in the least. I was watching the skies, and was hoping the gathering thunderstorms would cancel it, and for a time it did. Then the clouds moved off, and the march was on again, sooo we fell in and off we went. About 3 miles into the march, the weather came back, and guess what, an F-3 tornado!, The stories about the sky turning green are absolutely true, we got beat to **** by the hail, drowned by the rain and of course 2 people lost their weapon so we couldn't leave till they were found. No one was injured, but what a miserable day.

" Along came a yellow, two piece pvc rain suit made by Uniroyal, and it usually stayed folded up inside the brakeman's grip. "

That was a good place for it, other than the fact that you had to lug it around in your grip! 
Yes, they would keep the rain off of you, however, it didn't make much difference as you sweated so much wearing it that you still wound up soaking wet inside!!!

Re:  #90's great story...

It is 165 miles from San Berdoo to Fullerton, and another approx. 103 miles on to San Diego.  This is off-topic, but I can't get a question out of my mind:

In timeslip terms, how many miles were you guys claiming?  That must have been a sweet paying job which usually got you back home in 12 hours.  Amazing.

Rob, the milepost at Fullerton has that number because the mileposts are numbered from Barstow, through San Bernardino (MP 81), then over the Second District via Pasadena, through Los Angeles onto the Third District to Fullerton (MP 165), where they continue ascending down the Fourth District through San Diego to the end of the line at National City. 

The SDX ran over the Third District through Riverside and Corona to Atwood, where it diverged onto the Olive District to Orange, where it entered the Fourth District to go to San Diego. It paid 144 miles each direction. There were two crews which alternated days 7 days a week. So every other day was a day off. Sometimes we had to go to the hotel in San Diego, but we flipped more often than not.  We turned out onto the Olive District before we got as far as Fullerton, which is only 46 miles from San Bernardino via the Third District. 

Good story.  Thanks for sharing.