My wife I went to our 45th Baylor reunion in Waco, Texas. I noticed quite a few very heavy freights back and forth through Calvert where we shacked up in a b&b. I don't know the modern diesel locomotives but each freight had 3 of the large diesels on the front and 3 large locomotives pushing the rear. There are some long and comparatively steep grades in central Texas. It was really cool.
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Those trains with rear pushers are getting fairly common - I see them rolling through the Dallas metro area from time to time, although it's usually with just a single pusher. Usually UP trains, but may have seen a few BNSF pushers, but don't recall for sure.
The heaviest train ever operated on Union Pacific originated out of Mason City, IA on Sept. 27, 2012. [Train number] MMCSAS-27 totaled 233 cars, 32,061 [trailing] tons and 10,873 feet [in length] (that’s 2.1 miles). The DP configuration was 3 X 2 x 2 x EOT (end-of-train device).
I'm curious, since I'm more into the 40s and 50s railroading, what are the large road diesels the UP uses on these heavy trains?
The Union Pacific's Longest train on record was over 18000 feet in 2010. Nine engines on this train! Engine configuration was 3x2x2x2
Regards,
Swafford
That's incredible. About 54,000 horsepower????
Good Day,
General Electric's ES44DC, ES44AC, ES44C4, & ET44AC have 4400 hp.
Union Pacific designation for ES44AC's are AC45CCTE.
The train in the video with a power configuration on 3x2x2x2 had 39,600 hp. The train was reported to be over 3 miles long.
Regards,
Swafford
Trains running through San Bernardino (UP and BNSF) without stopping seem to be consistently running a pair of pushers to cover the Cajon grades. I don't know if BNSF is even using their helper pockets any more. The ones that are built up or broken down at San Bernardino don't seem to run with pushers. I'm sure Doug (Laidoffsick) would be able to elaborate on this.
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