Huge long real train with dozens of military vehicles passes through Oregon

We're about to invade Canada.  After all, that's the only logical explanation, right?

Nice photos. It's interesting to wondering where they going. Alaska, Pacific, National Guard in the area... the President just lifted the ban on military items with VietNam.

TexasSP posted:

We're about to invade Canada.  After all, that's the only logical explanation, right?

That was one of my first thoughts, but maybe they just move them south to Mexico after dark (and all covered over) to throw everyone off track.

Ace posted:

TexasSP posted:

We're about to invade Canada.  After all, that's the only logical explanation, right?

That was one of my first thoughts, but maybe they just move them south to Mexico after dark (and all covered over) to throw everyone off track.

Good idea, running loops like we do with our models.  Dropping off and picking up nothing, running back and forth.

They are headed to Cleveland for the Convention.

I can't make out the bumper markings, almost looks like 1st Infantry Division on one of those HEMMETs.

it's no big deal, probably a unit heading down to NTC at Ft Irwin. I rail-loaded countless vehicles at railheads to get them there and JRTC at Fort Polk when I was in heavy mech units. Where I work, my building is right alongside the line running to JBLM (formerly known at Ft Lewis) and I see unit movements like this all the time.

This move was in the trade press recently. It is a reserve unit replacing another unit at one of the Southern California training bases. I think it was Barstow or 29 Palms. When I read the article the number of vehicles moving was impressive. 

p51 posted:

I can't make out the bumper markings, almost looks like 1st Infantry Division on one of those HEMMETs.

it's no big deal, probably a unit heading down to NTC at Ft Irwin. I rail-loaded countless vehicles at railheads to get them there and JRTC at Fort Polk when I was in heavy mech units. Where I work, my building is right alongside the line running to JBLM (formerly known at Ft Lewis) and I see unit movements like this all the time.

Unfortunately my camera was set on low rez from a previous shot. This train took me by surprise and I didn't remember to re-adjust my camera on short notice! Bummer. Or maybe I'm in on the disinformation conspiracy also ...

Very cool sight none the less.  I remember traveling to Birmingham from Houston several years back, I cam across two big rigs carrying M1A2's east bound just at a gas station near Winnie, TX.  It was a heck of a thing to witness.

Once I saw an entire train of M1 Abrams tanks on a siding in Wisconsin. I can only imagine they were on their way to or back from the factory in Lima Ohio

the trump train

Wonder if the guy in the cab of the truck on the last car is thinking of driving it off?

I just noticed you mentioned they were heading north through Oregon.

My money is on one of the brigades of the 2nd ID out of JBLM. That's where almost all the West coast Stryker units are (and where the concept started, as I was in the very first one of these - 3rd Brigade, 2nd Infantry Division- during the transition from heavy mech).

Getting all that back to the JBLM railhead will be tough, as the line through there is being totally ripped up and new rails on concrete ties to Amtrak standards is being laid in there because all passenger traffic will be detoured from the Bennett tunnel line through Tacoma along the Puget Sound due to the bottleneck of the single-track tunnel there. By next year, trains like that will be in the hole as the Cascades and Coast Starlights race by at over 70 MPH through a comically dense population area for those speeds. Train buffs and law enforcement here is waiting for the huge numbers of grade crossing incidents that will happen once passenger traffic is zipping through an area that hasn't seen fast passenger runs since the steam era...

gunrunnerjohn posted:

Wonder if the guy in the cab of the truck on the last car is thinking of driving it off?

I didn't notice that! A guy in the "caboose" ? A trainload like that warrants some security guards.

Question for you military train experts: would these flatcars be custom-built military spec?

We don't have enough soldiers left to use them so they are going to storage. 

gunrunnerjohn posted:

Wonder if the guy in the cab of the truck on the last car is thinking of driving it off?

Am I the only one who doesn't see anyone in the cab?

I see him (possibly). It might be the headrest of the seat though.

I figured it was probably the headrest, but it caught my eye.   Come on, at least a chuckle, right?

Yeah, soldiers can have big heads, but not that big (nor that square).

That's the driver's seatback and the pillar support for the roof behind it.

We always called them, "Hemmets" though the name is actually Heavy Expanded Mobility Tactical Truck (or HEMTT, on paper). I had to qualify to drive one as the company master driver officer (among my many extra duties) and I liked driving them as you have excellent views of where you're going. You can drive right up to something within inches, with the view you have from the cab. They also have a decent turn radius for something that long.

Those flat cars are DOD cars with the 3 axle trucks. They're definitely built for heavy loads. I wonder if these military trains get priority traffic rights for security reasons. 

Around 1994, the Department of Defense bought a good number of flatcars for military trains, as the early-1950's DODX cars were becoming obsolete as the Army vehicles were getting larger and heavier.  However, when they were delivered, they all failed mechanical inspection because of something - after these many years, I can't remember exactly what, but I recall it being something having to do with grab iron placement and clearance - so we had about 200 of them stored in Brownwood, Texas, for a couple of years, and, in the meantime used TTOX flats for the many military trains into and out of Fort Hood.  Finally, the Army was able to have them modified and put to use.  At that time, the Lampassas Subdivision was my territory as Assistant Superintendent, and Fort Hood was a good, and frequent, customer.

It appears to me that the cars in the photos are those cars, plus some TTOX flats.  Green DODX ones with 6-wheel trucks for tanks and red or yellow ones with 4-wheel trucks for other equipment.