Posted by The Ely Times | Sep 19, 2022 | News | 0

By Mark S. Bassett Special to The Ely Times

Operating a 19th century railroad in the 21st century can provide challenges, as we found out on Saturday, Sept. 10. There are two classes of railroaders, those who have derailed and those who will. On Friday, the crew of Locomotive 81 joined the class of those who derailed through no fault of their own. The railroad gods were just against them that day.

One of the most popular programs at the Nevada Northern Railway National Historic Landmark is our Be The Engineer. On Friday, a trip was scheduled to depart at 1 p.m. The train departed on time. At the end of our line, seven miles from Ely. We have a wye to turn our trains around.

The locomotive pulled into the wye, reversed direction to complete the movement around the wye, then disaster struck. The wheel flange on the tender truck broke off. With the flange gone, there was nothing to keep the wheel on the rail and THUNK, the wheel set was on the ground and the tender derailed. Fortunately, the crew had heard the thunk and were stopping, when the tender dropped off the rail.

The locomotive crew contacted John Henry, our master mechanic. Henry went to the site and tried a couple tricks to get the locomotive rerailed and back to Ely. Unfortunately, none of the tricks worked. Locomotive 81 would have to spend the night on the wye. The decision was made to drop the fire and drain the tender. Locomotive 81 would come home cold.

A watchman was selected to stay with the locomotive overnight. Meanwhile plans were made to bring our 1907 steam-powered wrecking crane to the derailment site the next morning to rerail Locomotive 81. In addition to rerailing Locomotive 81, we were committed to support Race the Rails, and our weekend operating schedule.

Plans were drawn up, staff and volunteers assigned to different duties, Saturday planned to be a loooong day. The wreck crew assembled at 6 a.m., and made up their train, they had to bring the steam crane to the derailment.

Fortunately, the crane could be positioned behind the tender to raise it. Their train consisted of Locomotive 204, our ex-Southern Pacific, ex BHP SD-9, the 1907 steam-powered wrecking crane and the tool car. They needed to clear the yard before 8 a.m., so they would not interfere with the Race The Rails train scheduled departure at 8 a.m.

The wrecking crane arrived at the site and was positioned in place. This is a steam-powered wrecking crane, that means a fire has to be built in the firebox to heat the water in the boiler to produce the steam to run the crane.

This is a 4-hour process. In the meantime, the crane’s outriggers need to be spread out and blocked up with wood. The outriggers ratch out of the crane body by hand. The huge blocks are placed under the outriggers by hand to stabilize the crane. This is just plain hard, dirty physical labor. It can’t be rushed.

Once the crane was blocked and the boiler producing steam, it was time to lift the tender to remove the truck with the broken flange and swap it with a temporary truck to bring the locomotive down the hill. This is a choreographed maneuver. The crane operator has very little visibility, he must rely on the ground crew members for directions for turning the crane, lifting the boom and the hooks. Nothing goes quickly, everything is big and heavy. The wreck area is a tight area.

Working as a well-oiled machine, the spare truck was removed from the tool car. Then the tender of Locomotive 81 was lifted to pull out the damaged truck. The spare truck was placed under the tender and the tender gently lowered into place on top of the truck. Success!!!

But we’re not done yet, everything has to be torn down and put away. Locomotive’s 81 damaged truck is placed on the tool car. All of the blocking, chains and blocks are then put away. Once everything is put away, the train is made up to bring everything home. The train consisted of Locomotive 204, Locomotive 81, the wrecking crane and the tool car. The weight of the train was 620,000 pounds or 310 tons coming down a rather steep track with grades ranging from 2.2% to over 1%. Two stops are made coming down the hill just to check everything, luckily everything is fine. Just after dark the train arrives at the East Ely yard. Everything is secured in the engine house. The next day will see repairs made to Locomotive 81 and by Monday Locomotive 81 will be back in service.

This was an all-hands incident. While the wrecking crew was working to get Locomotive 81 back on the rails, the rest of the crew was still running the railroad. It was the combined efforts of the staff and volunteers that allowed the big wheels to keep turning here over the weekend. Everyone pitched in!

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