It's a bright and warm February 2021 afternoon as Arizona Eastern B39-8 2322 leads a quartet of 4-axle GEs rolling into Bowie, AZ on Union Pacific's Sunset Route with a freight from Lordsburg, New Mexico. In a few hundred feet they will switch onto AE's home trackage and continue their journey to Globe, AZ.
In vain, the wispy fingers of afternoon virgas desperately reach towards the Sky Islands of the Little Dragoon Mountains late on a February 2021 afternoon as a set of GEs roll westbound containers through Cochise, Arizona on the grade up to Dragoon Summit.
Sunset Afternoon.
SD70M 4460 leads a westbound stack train over the old highway between Bowie and Willcox, AZ on a February 2021 afternoon.
There will be no FREDs that have been gutted and placed upon a short piece of track, there to be lovingly refurbished with all the things deemed necessary for nightly comfort, a landscaped bed of pansies waving gently in the breeze to greet the weary traveler in his quest for evening accommodations.
There will be no buzzing neon sign hanging jauntily at the entrance to the property proclaiming vacancy, or not, at the EOT Motel.
Their flanks will not sport the colorful liveries and slogans and company emblems of all the great railroads that we have known and loved for so many years---
And watch die.
No one will rise early, slide their feet into warm slippers and perch themselves in the cupola or bay window, steaming coffee in hand, there to wipe off the night’s breath from window panes and enjoy a glorious morning view of some mountain range or memorable curve on a line whose history was first inked in a century past.
FRED will never know enshrinement in some city park or on some disjointed house track adjacent to a preserved old depot, his new home surrounded by chain link and barbed wire, adorned with signs that announce the hazards and penalties of climbing on the equipment.
And, to the taxpayer’s relief, there certainly won’t be any preservation groups gathering to desperately wave “SAVE THE FRED!” banners as city council meetings are called to discuss the disposition of some unsightly and graffiti covered piece of railroad memorabilia that no one ever comes to see anymore.
The golden age of children waving enthusiastically as the caboose breezes past a grade crossing died almost a full generation ago, as did the jobs that were lost to a box that has no arms to wave with, and whose only breath is a faint hiss of air escaping through worn gladhand rubbers.
No heart.
No soul.
No moving parts.
No generator belt for power.
And no smokejack showing signs of a hot stove brewing coffee.
Just the inhuman act of flashing red.
Rick Malo©2023
The full moon rises just before the sun sets over the desert country at Marathon, Texas as a pair of EMDs roll autoracks eastbound on February 4th, 2023.
Gold in the desert.
A summertime thunderstorm drenches a parched land and sliding-door refugees that have taken up temporary residence in the siding at Marathon, Texas on the evening of June 28th, 2022.
"Down from Dragoon."
The sun dies fast in winter. It casts a desperate beam through a gap in the Little Dragoon Mountains and grabs the curve of the earth, hanging on just a little longer, warming cold steel just a few degrees as eastbound containers roll out of the curve at milepost 1055 and into the shadows of the Gunnison Hills.
Three graduates of the Building 10 Institute in Erie will do their very best to hold gravity in check as the grade steepens to 1.36%.
By the time they reach the Sulphur Springs Valley and speed across the Willcox Playa, the sky will be deep with the pinks and purples of twilight, and they'll have green all the way to Lordsburg.
***
Near Cochise, Arizona. February 19th, 2021.
The April sun just cracks over the heights of the ancient Paisano caldera, and 710s and GEVOs scream like banshees as they dig into the railhead and fight gravity hard on the 1 percent grade up off the Marfa plateau. With a dead-on-hours eastbound train in the siding at milepost 620, the hogger on 9056 has got beans and a hotel room in Alpine on his mind as he bends his eastbound hotshot around the curve and up towards Paisano Pass.
He's got 12 of the most beautiful miles in Texas to go.
On May 24th, 2021, the Union Pacific stubbed its toe and scattered shipping containers across both mainline tracks at Separ, New Mexico, and even though crews worked hard to clear the mess and open one track for business, the bottle neck existed into July of that year.
Early on the morning of July 4th, 2021, the 7010 and her two GE companions plus two mid-train DPUs have struggled with a monster intermodal train since leaving Santa Teresa, and even though out of sight around the curve, their battle with the 1 percent grade up out of Raso was epic and audible for eternity.
It was no difficult task for the 2560 and her short hotshot to catch her, slipping through the crossover at Luzena and running around on the eastbound track.
Here, just east of Willcox, Arizona, the 7010, tongue hanging out and winded, takes a breather on the westbound main as the conductor climbs down to watch the 2560 breeze by in a flash.
With dawn just breaking over the Chiricahua mountains, the chill and damp morning air of the Sulphur Springs valley is shattered as 13,100 horsepower roll westbound freight down the Sunset Route just east of Willcox, Arizona on February 14th, 2021.
The Sunset Limited on the Sunset Route at sunset.
At 8:55 pm on April 19th, 2021 Amtrak Train #2 storms past the siding at Strobel, Texas just east of Alpine near milepost 600.
