Is there anything natural known to man harder than frozen earth or water? If
you've read Stephen Ambrose recent work "Nothing Like it in the World" you
are familiar with how the U.P. laid rails on the frozen Missouri to operate
trains over.
One night working Eastbound on the C&I w/f we stopped on the main at the East
end of Waterman to s/o an mty 40' box for seed corn loading at DeKalb Seed.
Don't recall the month but there was plenty of white stuff on the ground. The
mainline switch wasn't too difficult as train movements keep mainline
switches relatively clean. The switch off the passing trk to the backtrack
took a good deal of digging and sweeping to get thrown over. Now as we shoved
back in the dark toward the loading dock the snow definitely was rapidly
getting much deeper. So we flagged the movement to a stop. Walked ahead and
beside what grew to be a six plus foot drift next to the building and on top
of the rails. Knowing that 20 tons or so of mty boxcar would crush the snow
and the end of the car would act as a plow we again signaled for the move to
continue shoving west. All went well for a few feet as the car plowed a path
through the drift. But then the West end of the car began to ascend to the
point that the angle left no doubt that the West wheels were no longer in
touch w/the rails but were supported only by ice/snow.So the stop sign was
again waved by the lanterns.A quick conference determined that leaving the
car resting at the 30 or so degree angle wasn't wise so a go ahead slow sign
was issued. The car was ever so slowly pulled east until it again was level.
A walk around was performed as best as could be done in the deep snow and
using lanterns to determine that all wheels were back on the rails. A hand
brake was secured and car left for another and warmer day/night.
Leo
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