Laughing my ass off big fucking time!!! I wonder if U.P. (Union Pacific), is going to charge him extra (the boss), for moving the freight around the middle one!!! LOL
That’s exactly what I was thinking - why have them all in one single line? There must be some underlying logic as to the manner and location of storage?
To me, the enormity of it all is that there isn’t enough demand to keep these engines running and online, because we have too damn many trucks out there, burning up fossil fuel at amazing rates and poisoning our atmosphere where we’re having the hottest month in record in June. That’s the enormity of it not how much they spent on the engines or whatever. Freight trains can carry 1 ton of freight 500 miles on 1 gallon of fuel! Why aren’t we using them? Dammit? Are we that stupid? The answer of course is yes we are, we just don’t care about the future.
"As Union Pacific's business volumes increase, so does the need for additional locomotives. Since last fall, locomotive shop craftsmen have returned about 650 stored locomotives to active service." > quote from an online source
I'm glad that I happened to find this video. While driving from my home in New Mexico to Tucson I pass this area all of the time. Though only a few dozen are visible from Interstate 10, I have often wondered how many were actually out there. Its a shame that some of these locomotives will eventually, if not already, succumb to vandalism.
That didn't last very long though. One good example of that is the 110 SD9043MAC's that Norfolk Southern purchased from Union Pacific.Most of them already had wear and tear in the frames,that's why they were sold dirt cheap.Some of the SD9043MAC's that were acquired came from CEFX as well.All of them were rebuilt into SD70ACU's until suddenly 65 of the units were sold to PRLX.That was both a stupid and massive waste of money,from start to finish.45 of them are still currently on the roster.The rest of those rebuilds are finally getting scrapped because nobody wants them and as mentioned,the majority were already problematic before rebuilding began.
a little over 12 yrs ago when diesel hit $5/gal, they had anything that could turn a wheel out on the rails.. all across southern idaho there were trains with engines in them without engine numbers on them or RR ownership lettering...that was crazy
Someone asked why park locomotive's like this when you could simply buy new ones? New locomotive's cost depending on the model between 2.5 and 4 million dollars new plus you could be looking at a lead time of a year or more. The locomotive's in this video are bought and paid for. And can be easily put back in service by running them through a diesel shop to make sure everything is up to snuff. I've seen locomotive's get pulled out of the dead line and are on the fuel pad ready to go in under 24 hours both EMD and GE locomotive's. I heard over the yard radio an engineer report his U-23C died on the hump. The flying squad ( electrician and mechanic in a company truck with running repair tools and parts) reported to the shop that this engine was toast as a rod went through the engine block. Being a cast engine block this engine became a rolling parts supply. Within 45 minutes a U23-C in storage was pulled from the dead line and brought into the shop and 4 mechanics and 2 electricians started inspecting her and fired her up in just over 17 hours as they ran her through a 90 day inspection and she was fired up and run through a self load test then ok'd for service. As we have seen the Norfolk Southern Railroad has been buying surplus power from other railroads notably DC motored locomotive's and rebuilding them as AC powered locomotive's making them pull better than the DC motors they were built with. The railroad that bought the used locomotive's to be updated gets spare parts that are serviceable immediately. And a few months later gets a rebuilt locomotive for less than let's say $ right around one million dollars per unit versus 3.5 to 4 million dollars per unit and maybe a year later before its delivered. This policy also allows the railroad to maintain the backshop forces and keep them working doing good work. The U23-C that the engine failed on? They pulled another U-boats engine from the dead line and pulled the engine from it and installed the engine into the U23-C to put the hump engine back in service as it is wired up to a 6 axle slug and was back in service after 8 days from the day it died to back in service. The engine they used as a replacement power on the hump went back to the deadline stored serviceable. The comment about the railroad assigning police officers to watch over the stored locomotive's are worth every penny as there watching over a couple of billion dollars worth of power, that makes their time and effort worth while. When you have surplus power that's fully serviceable why not store the excess instead of scrapping or selling them. Many railroads have been doing that going well back into the steam age. Back in the mid 30's every railroad had surplus steam power laid up drained and stored because business at that time was down considerably but the railroads knew when business picked up they were going to need that surplus steam locomotives and they started getting put back into service as business picked up. By 1939-1940 most of the surplus power was back in service and locomotive's that were to be scrapped were put back into service as freight business kept climbing and even old less efficient locomotive's were back in service as they were here now and didn't have to be built in some distant shop.
It's strange that they didn't seem to have put any protection over the glass areas, and as best I could tell, air inlets and exhaust ports were also open. A few years of the sun pouring into a cab will seriously degrade plastic knobs and instrument faces, and they must have to shovel a hell of a lot of grit and sand out of the mechanical spaces.
In addition I am sure they get some kind of Government funding to keep this surplus on hand. They are part of the war strategy. Those 1400 idle locomotives can move a lot of military supplies quickly across our country if the geopolitical demand arises.
lol stole my thunder... railways and rolling stock are in extreme demand in wartime and you don't want to be unprepared and overwhelmed; plus factories tend not to make cars or trains preferring tanks in worse case scenarios. You won't need more, you have it already.
James Shanks lol is All That Surplus Power Is Easily Available in Times Of War. As The United States of America found out in both World Wars and Korea.
Nice! there are quite a few Dash 9s in this line (some recently repainted), while the rest are SD60Ms and narrow nose C40-8s, which UP doesn't use in regular traffic too much! 1:49 an engine in C&NW paint can be seen to the right! (also seen at 2:45) It's quite amazing such a long locmotive sotrage line exists outside of a major freight yard! some of those older engines should be sent to museums!
I didn't notice any Dash 9's, but I wouldn't be surprised if some were there. I also didn't see any standard cab C40-8's (Only three are even left on the roster today), but there are quite a few widenose C40/C41-8W's numbered below 9560 among the SD60M's in this video. Get a great view of a freshly repainted C41-8W at 3:57, for instance.
Union Pacific hasn't used any of the SD60's,SD60M's,C41-8's,and C40-8W's at all for several years... Many of the C41-8's were sold off to Canadian National.However,only a handful of SD60's remain on the roster but are resorted to local and yard power service.The SD60M's are all gone,there was literally only one unit left recently somewhere in Oklahoma that managed to get prolonged usage as yard power. Many of them were sold to Norfolk Southern to be rebuilt as SD60E's. Alot of SD60M's that weren't rebuilt as SD59MX's for California were scrapped as well if not stored.There is hardly any C40-8W's left as almost the entirety of them have been scrapped.It's extremely doubtful that they will be rebuilt or used during any power shortage because they aren't rebuild capable like the C44-9W's which Union Pacific finally has begun rebuilding programs for.
They weren't there the last time I drove by that area. I think UP was instituting a new Power Usage Policy. Moved a bunch to various parts of the country.
nope. Some of them went into service during 2018 because of the good economy, but during trump’s trade war, they all went back into storage due to low traffic and now PSR and the pandemic.
@@PalpatineExOrder66 The total US production of coal dropped by more than 21% in the first three years of the Trump administration, and I'm sure it will be down even further in 2020. The economics of energy are agnostic to politics, renewables aren't going to stop becoming cheaper and more efficient.
Hard to imagine, 20yrs ago when the locomotives were built, we manufactured enough in this country to keep those engines busy. Now our trade deficit with China is so huge and growing it's not even reported on the news. .
Nice vid! I'm no expert, but I'd love to see more federal programs that incentivize railroads to overhaul existing locomotives rather than forcing them to buy new Tier whatever-it-is-today locos. At worst, we're talking about 1,000,000 horsepower not in use and 63,000 tons of unused metal that loses value every day from one Class I hauler at one site. At a glance, these are older SD70s and Dash 8 or 9s, so these aren't ancient units. The numbers probably don't work out for the biz, but from a regulatory standpoint, more can be done to reduce overall waste, not solely focused on fuel savings and emissions.
Union Pacific is slowly rebuilding their C44-9W's into AC4400CW's. They are scattered at GE in Justin and Fort Worth Texas.I seriously doubt that the C40-8W's will ever be rebuilt,even though there has been discussion,if any are still awaiting in storage.Union Pacific sold most of their C41-8's years ago to Canadian National which actually still have them active. CSX & BNSF are the only two Class 1's that have given prolonged usage to the -8's with BNSF still having a handful of B40-8W's and CSX keeping their CW40-8's. Union Pacific recently has decided to put nearly all of their SD70M's in storage or scrap them either way.The only units that won't be tampered with are SD70M's still under warranty.The only modern EMD units that still have some time left on them are the SD70ACE's.GE rebuild programs are far more common because of better software and overall technological advancements.Not to mention easier on emissions testing since all of those units are four stroke.Modern EMD units have been more expensive to both rebuild and maintain over the years,nearly all of them end up in storage once age hits the mark and lesser rebuild programs have been taking place over time.EPA regulations killed EMD and discontinued the 710 series for the SD70 variants because of it's higher carbon footprint and not upholding into tier four compliance.EMD had to retrofit thousands of units with exhaust manifold silencers to bypass this. The ET44AH's have actually managed to be better on efficiency and great pullers due to higher tractive effort like most GE units,much like the ES44AC's. The SD70AH-T4's were failed from the start.Ironically,they flopped just like the SD90MAC's that they were based on.Union Pacific still owns 100 of them but CSX finally got ridden of the 10 ST70AH-T4's and gave them back to PRLX.They are heavily disliked by many crews. Norfolk Southern,Kansas City Southern,and BNSF had their leases of SD70AH-T4's years ago but weren't satisfied at all and canceled any order requests. However,all of the PRLX SD70AH-T4's more recently have ended up as leased units to Ferromex in Mexico for the time being...
@@ddthompson42 No problem.I also forgot to mention about the certain amount of SD60M's that are still active but were rebuilt into SD59MX's for usage and regulations in California.SD60M's have been in storage for a long time now.Although a handful of SD60's have remained on the roster as yard and local units only.
It was the original main line. ADOT wanted to replace the Railroad overpass over I10 because it was too low. ADOT, AZ State and UP came up with a plan and now the new main line runs along I10 on the north side. Right now all these units are gone but we have a Ballast Train in there.
Should be double tracked with crossovers at regular intervals to enable pulling certain units for production, to sell or for scrapping. Reminds me of a commercial aircraft boneyard.
Exactly. Davis Monthan for the UP. Corrosion control in the dessert. Secure due to isolated location. Zero storage fees. Same thing the air force does.
No wonder in early 2020 I could see UP locomotives in British Columbia pulling Canadian trains. When the Canadian railroads got a huge surge of demand for both grain and oil hauling at the same time. UP managers were probably saying words like "What do you mean you only want 50 locomotives" Or whatever number were requested.
Big drop in coal demand has caused a lot of storage. Watched a video just a few days ago of hundreds of BNSF locomotives in storage in the Powder River Basin. Oill traffic could be the next to go. :-(
scottystiffchicken I live here in central Arizona. The number of rattle snakes depends on the number of mice, rats, ground squirrels, pack rats available for them to eat. My guess is about a hundred rattlers per acre under the right conditions in unpopulated areas. You can look right at a rattler and not see it because their skin color is almost an exact match to their surroundings. There are even rattle snakes that live in trees. Arizona is perfect for rattlers, not so much for people.
In a similar fashion as a child, I witnessed endless steam Locos being taken to South Wales for breaking, must have been about 1965 - 70. Fortunately here in Britain we have a strong Steam following, and loads of Locos have been preserved.
OMG, I saw a CNW DASH 9-44CW in that mix. I noticed that most of the fleet is older 1990 era and before models. They are not Tier I-IV compatiable. If any were to return to service, they would be rebuilt to at least Tier II standards. If not then these units are heading to Class II or short line owners. Worst yet, some or most would be scrapped.
Best case is for these to be sold to short lines, a lot of these units would be costly for UP to upgrade, a short line could use thes Dash 8s and 9s very well, and those MAcs would also be useful aswell, if UP actually wants to make a profit, selling them would be the best bet
Union Pacific is actually rebuilding their C44-9W's into C44ACM's.There is many fleets of them lined up at GE in Justin and Forth Worth Texas.The SD70M's are finally being retired.The oldest of the units and/or with the highest usage are getting scrapped.Brownsville Texas has been getting them delivered in bunches for scrap values.The units were lesser hours and use on them will be put into storage like they've done to every single series on their roster.The only SD70M's that will remain active and not messed with are the units still under warranty. Before retirement was official,some shortlines and programs were purchasing SD70M's in large numbers and dirt cheap because of how ragged and beat up they have been for years. Most shortlines won't take any GE units,there is very few with -8's and rarely any with -7's still running and hardly some are starting to get retired -9's. EMD units on shortlines or even Class 2's are 10/1 due to costs and widespread distribution or resources. The only reason why Class 1's have hugely surpassed owning GE units versus any remaining EMD units (GP40-2's & SD40-2's not included) is because of EPA regulations and technological advancements.Not to mention the mainteance and problematics that alot of modern EMD units come with,and CAT/PRLX made it worse in my opinion.Also,on a quick note to the other guy,Union Pacific never owned any SD70MAC's... There is barely any T2 units around because most are all T3 if not T4. EMD discontinued production because of emissions testing and got their reputation ruined by CAT/PRLX. This is also why thousands of units have exhaust manifold silencers on them.
Ok IK a lot of people see this so I’ll tell you all this Back in August UP began to pull power from storage back into service and then most of those dash 8s got sold or scrapped as for the dash 9s and sd60s I’ve been seeing countless units going back into service so don’t worry to much most of the units shown here have either been sold, scrapped, or back into service
Passing by last week, it looked like some units have been removed on the east end of the cut. There is no rail access on the west end of this track anymore. The locomotives started going in there in 2015. All are defueled and have caps on their exhaust. UP has a subcontract security monitoring the equipment, plus ground cameras. This is not a open petting zoo. You will be prosecuted, if caught trespassing. Treat this as any other railroad property and respect it as such. This line was part of the Lordsburg Sub mainline and was straightened on the north side of I-10. The west end went over I-10 and was deemed dangerous for vehicle travel, so it was rerun north of the interstate.
I'm curious how old these are. In the early 70's I worked for the Erie G.E. plant where they used to build locomotives. I imagine that section was moved to Texas.
Justin and Fort Worth Texas have General Electric plants which is where alot of their rebuild programs are. Good portions of those units in the video are GE C44-9W's and EMD SD70M's or SD60M's which date back to the 1990's. The SD60M's go back to the 1980's. The SD60M's have all been gone and in storage for a couple of years now.Alot of them were scrapped and/or sold.Any of the surviving units that were given prolonged usage were rebuilt as SD59MX's for emissions regulations and remain for service in California. There is a handful of SD60's at that still on the roster but they are only used as yard and local power.Just like GP40-2's and SD40-2's. Union Pacific is rebuilding the C44-9W's as C44ACM's so those will stay around for awhile just like the AC6000CW's that were also rebuilt.Currently the SD70M's are finally being retired.Most of them having high end use and hours are getting scrapped but units with less problems are being put into storage. There is consists of them awaiting to be scrapped in Brownsville Texas. Even before getting retired some shortlines and programs acquired them dirt cheap in good numbers because of how beat up they were.Just like when Norfolk Southern purchased SD9043MAC's from Union Pacific and some from CEFX to rebuild as SD70ACU's.Most of them had cracks in the frame.Norfolk Southern sooner than later sold off half of what they got to PRLX and now they are being scrapped. The only SD70M's that aren't being removed are units still under warranty.
I believe most of these are not CARB compliant power units and are also D/C power. Just like the Air Force bone yard south of Tucson AZ is a great place to keep unit till needed or rebuilt.
Yeah those reasons make sense and I know coal traffic is down too. UP is smart to store them out in the Desert since they will hold up okay for future usage or to be sold off.
Piss on California. CARB is the reason why Caterpillar stopped manufacturing engines for highway use. The representative told us they jjust couldn't meet their demands. The demands of people who claim cow farts contribute to global warming.
I hope the mechanics added some biobore to the fuel tanks in each locomotive to prevent algae growth. I’m sure if any were to be summoned back to service that the shop has a checklist of items to review prior to putting back into the operational fleet.
Would you happen to know how long that spur has been there. Watching the drone footage, it looked to me like the ballast was brand new, as if that spur was put in specifically to store those loco's. Thanks, UP veteran, Roseville Locomotive Facility
@@ET_Don The spur was actually an old alignment of the south track on the subdivision at one time. They may have installed new ballast on the spur so it would hold up to the weight of the locomotives. At this time that is all I have concerning the spur. If I get more information or if this is in error I will soon correct.
You would think UP would rotate those engines with all the active engines. A sitting loco , car, truck, ect... is the worse thing one can do to a machine. Rust, mices, the weather will destroy any sitting machine
That's why they are in AZ. Limited moisture. Outside of the UV damage on the paint. They shouldn't really have issues. I'd wager they do come out and turn them over once In awhile.
Should sell some off to south America, Asia or Africa. They dont have near the environmental standards we do here in north America and in Europe or Australia. Let these big boys work again. But instead theyre left to rust.
@@johnpodo north America uses standard gauge. Although there are some countries that use narrow gauge, or their own specific gauge for their country, there are close to 20 3rd world countries in those 3 continents that use standard gauge, as well as some 2nd world countries. Plus some of the island Caribbean countries also use standard gauge, plus Mexico, and none of them have the restrictive standards faced by American and Canadian railroad companies.
@@ralphvelthuis2359Whether the trains are fit for a country will depend less in track gauge but on loading gauge. All those locks would fit on UK rail track, after all that's where standard track gauge came from, but the first tunnel or station and there are problems as the UK loading gauge is a lot smaller (one of the problems of being first).
@@ianhodgson5577 : Correct. Loading gauge issues are a huge reason why freight rail in Europe isn't nearly as extensive as it is in the US, among other reasons. Plate H is literally a pipe dream there in many places.
Poor share holders, all that motive stock sitting doing nothing. They still have to be maintained though, machines are made to RUN, not sit doing nothing.
Those trains would sit around for 50 years and a mechanic could get them running in like 3 hours I work on these things everyday they're so basic there's not much to them and they're built to last you probably have to fix a couple of wires and the thing would run like a top
It would cost a very large fortune to equip these with modern PTC equipment. They cycle these in & out of use or eventually sell them to short lines or for scrap. Currently we’re resurrecting some Dash 9 locos. They are also not as efficient as more modern units. I’m an electrical tech for UP. Don’t worry - UP is making plenty of money & just got a 6 billion dollar tax cut. BTW we’re not getting thousand dollar bonuses either.
I wonder how many of them are now a wonderful new home to some of the various desert critters? I can see it when they pull a couple out of line, drag them to a yard and have a mechanic come face to face with a rattle snake, or have a scorpion climb on him for a better view? Or find the ground squirrel colony who has been happily eating all the wires insulation. It might be a pretty good show when the africanized bees take issue to people moving around their pretty big hive. Yep, having been born and raised in these desert areas, I see a potential for minor little issues like when a ticked off yellow jacket nest come screaming out of the exhaust on first light off. I think it might be fun to grab a cold one and a lawn chair and watch the show, from a safe distance of course. Have fun!
If they stood like this somewhere in the former soviet union, they would be gone in mere months, simply disassembled by locals and moved to metal yards. First copper and aluminum, then steel.
If there's someone badass enough to go out into the middle of the dessert in a place not accessible by car and up a steep embankment to take a locomotive apart and haul away parts that weigh over 2000lbs (most of it steel) just for scrap they deserve it.
@@wwlb4970 I was working on a construction site in a bad area, after a few weeks nothing had been stolen, but they decided they should hire a security guard just to be safe. The first night the security guard was on duty we got robbed, I think we got robbed the next two or three more times with him on duty, they fired him and got a new guy, we never got robbed again.
Very nice and different video. I am surprised to see all the locomotives lined up on one track. Must be difficult to get parts / complete locomotive, if it is "down the line". Also, as another viewer has mentioned, why don't they cover openings etc? Greetings fra Denmark /Adam
The boss wants that one in the middle of the line
Laughing my ass off big fucking time!!! I wonder if U.P. (Union Pacific), is going to charge him extra (the boss), for moving the freight around the middle one!!! LOL
@@goodguygto stop laughing man, have some respect
That is exactly what I was going to say. I was here trying to think of it and how to write it.
I know of a controller in the UK that would do just that.
That’s exactly what I was thinking - why have them all in one single line? There must be some underlying logic as to the manner and location of storage?
I saw these heading into Tucson last summer. At first I thought I was witnessing the mother of all power moves.
We were driving from Texas to California in 2016 and saw this, I was amazed! I wondered how many there were there.
As you were right by Picacho peak
It is hard to comprehend the enormity of how many engines UP owns. 1400 engines is 16% of their fleet = 8750 total engines.
8,300 UP Units currently in Service. Purchase price varies from $ 1,000,000 to $ 3,000,000 each.
It is unfortunate that with all the engines they had, they never saved any Alco PA's or FA's ?
Too bad.
When Conrail came to be on April 1, 1976 they 10,000 locomotives in various states of operable and nonoperable condition
To me, the enormity of it all is that there isn’t enough demand to keep these engines running and online, because we have too damn many trucks out there, burning up fossil fuel at amazing rates and poisoning our atmosphere where we’re having the hottest month in record in June. That’s the enormity of it not how much they spent on the engines or whatever. Freight trains can carry 1 ton of freight 500 miles on 1 gallon of fuel! Why aren’t we using them? Dammit? Are we that stupid? The answer of course is yes we are, we just don’t care about the future.
@@jamesdaniel947 most of the missing "demand" was from Coal Cars ..... and too many coal power plants are closing down.
"As Union Pacific's business volumes increase, so does the need for additional locomotives. Since last fall, locomotive shop craftsmen have returned about 650 stored locomotives to active service." > quote from an online source
Wow, I'm just amazed at the videography. Outstanding work. Beautiful scenery!
I'm glad that I happened to find this video. While driving from my home in New Mexico to Tucson I pass this area all of the time. Though only a few dozen are visible from Interstate 10, I have often wondered how many were actually out there. Its a shame that some of these locomotives will eventually, if not already, succumb to vandalism.
Dixon, IL is also a storage yard of surplus UP locomotives. NS has been buying some of UP old power to upgrade them.
David Grounds lived in Dixon for years it's a serious train hub
That didn't last very long though.
One good example of that is the 110 SD9043MAC's that Norfolk Southern purchased from Union Pacific.Most of them already had wear and tear in the frames,that's why they were sold dirt cheap.Some of the SD9043MAC's that were acquired came from CEFX as well.All of them were rebuilt into SD70ACU's until suddenly 65 of the units were sold to PRLX.That was both a stupid and massive waste of money,from start to finish.45 of them are still currently on the roster.The rest of those rebuilds are finally getting scrapped because nobody wants them and as mentioned,the majority were already problematic before rebuilding began.
Wait... That TECHNICALLY makes this the longest train in the world 😳
Let’s see how much it can pull
@@haydencarlson2861 OMG, could pull the earth away from the sun I bet!
It's only three-hundred fifty some locomotives
@@TSMGL_UA-cam most looked like 4400HP units
True!
a little over 12 yrs ago when diesel hit $5/gal, they had anything that could turn a wheel out on the rails.. all across southern idaho there were trains with engines in them without engine numbers on them or RR ownership lettering...that was crazy
The locomotives are SD-60's and GE Dash 9's. I saw a number these type also dead lined in Milpitas at the old ex-WP yard
Over 1.75 million horse power. Just sitting there.
Nice drone footage, never seen the stored like that. Thanks for sharing!
D. Muse
Someone asked why park locomotive's like this when you could simply buy new ones? New locomotive's cost depending on the model between 2.5 and 4 million dollars new plus you could be looking at a lead time of a year or more. The locomotive's in this video are bought and paid for. And can be easily put back in service by running them through a diesel shop to make sure everything is up to snuff. I've seen locomotive's get pulled out of the dead line and are on the fuel pad ready to go in under 24 hours both EMD and GE locomotive's. I heard over the yard radio an engineer report his U-23C died on the hump. The flying squad ( electrician and mechanic in a company truck with running repair tools and parts) reported to the shop that this engine was toast as a rod went through the engine block. Being a cast engine block this engine became a rolling parts supply. Within 45 minutes a U23-C in storage was pulled from the dead line and brought into the shop and 4 mechanics and 2 electricians started inspecting her and fired her up in just over 17 hours as they ran her through a 90 day inspection and she was fired up and run through a self load test then ok'd for service. As we have seen the Norfolk Southern Railroad has been buying surplus power from other railroads notably DC motored locomotive's and rebuilding them as AC powered locomotive's making them pull better than the DC motors they were built with. The railroad that bought the used locomotive's to be updated gets spare parts that are serviceable immediately. And a few months later gets a rebuilt locomotive for less than let's say $ right around one million dollars per unit versus 3.5 to 4 million dollars per unit and maybe a year later before its delivered. This policy also allows the railroad to maintain the backshop forces and keep them working doing good work.
The U23-C that the engine failed on? They pulled another U-boats engine from the dead line and pulled the engine from it and installed the engine into the U23-C to put the hump engine back in service as it is wired up to a 6 axle slug and was back in service after 8 days from the day it died to back in service. The engine they used as a replacement power on the hump went back to the deadline stored serviceable.
The comment about the railroad assigning police officers to watch over the stored locomotive's are worth every penny as there watching over a couple of billion dollars worth of power, that makes their time and effort worth while.
When you have surplus power that's fully serviceable why not store the excess instead of scrapping or selling them. Many railroads have been doing that going well back into the steam age. Back in the mid 30's every railroad had surplus steam power laid up drained and stored because business at that time was down considerably but the railroads knew when business picked up they were going to need that surplus steam locomotives and they started getting put back into service as business picked up. By 1939-1940 most of the surplus power was back in service and locomotive's that were to be scrapped were put back into service as freight business kept climbing and even old less efficient locomotive's were back in service as they were here now and didn't have to be built in some distant shop.
It's strange that they didn't seem to have put any protection over the glass areas, and as best I could tell, air inlets and exhaust ports were also open. A few years of the sun pouring into a cab will seriously degrade plastic knobs and instrument faces, and they must have to shovel a hell of a lot of grit and sand out of the mechanical spaces.
In addition I am sure they get some kind of Government funding to keep this surplus on hand. They are part of the war strategy. Those 1400 idle locomotives can move a lot of military supplies quickly across our country if the geopolitical demand arises.
lol stole my thunder... railways and rolling stock are in extreme demand in wartime and you don't want to be unprepared and overwhelmed; plus factories tend not to make cars or trains preferring tanks in worse case scenarios. You won't need more, you have it already.
Great post! What do they do to mothball them? I imagine their drain of fuel and lube the cylinders/supercharger for storage?
James Shanks lol is All That Surplus Power Is Easily Available in Times Of War. As The United States of America found out in both World Wars and Korea.
Nice! there are quite a few Dash 9s in this line (some recently repainted), while the rest are SD60Ms and narrow nose C40-8s, which UP doesn't use in regular traffic too much!
1:49 an engine in C&NW paint can be seen to the right! (also seen at 2:45)
It's quite amazing such a long locmotive sotrage line exists outside of a major freight yard!
some of those older engines should be sent to museums!
I didn't notice any Dash 9's, but I wouldn't be surprised if some were there. I also didn't see any standard cab C40-8's (Only three are even left on the roster today), but there are quite a few widenose C40/C41-8W's numbered below 9560 among the SD60M's in this video. Get a great view of a freshly repainted C41-8W at 3:57, for instance.
Also at 3:48
Union Pacific hasn't used any of the SD60's,SD60M's,C41-8's,and C40-8W's at all for several years...
Many of the C41-8's were sold off to Canadian National.However,only a handful of SD60's remain on the roster but are resorted to local and yard power service.The SD60M's are all gone,there was literally only one unit left recently somewhere in Oklahoma that managed to get prolonged usage as yard power.
Many of them were sold to Norfolk Southern to be rebuilt as SD60E's.
Alot of SD60M's that weren't rebuilt as SD59MX's for California were scrapped as well if not stored.There is hardly any C40-8W's left as almost the entirety of them have been scrapped.It's extremely doubtful that they will be rebuilt or used during any power shortage because they aren't rebuild capable like the C44-9W's which Union Pacific finally has begun rebuilding programs for.
very nice photography. thanks for posting.
I would imagine the SD60's are getting near to rebuild time. 3:33 UP #2249 last seen on 3/11/2018 in Griffith, IN.
Wow. I just drove through Tucson Thanksgiving day moving to Henderson, NV from Houston. I wish I could have this.
They weren't there the last time I drove by that area.
I think UP was instituting a new Power Usage Policy.
Moved a bunch to various parts of the country.
People!!! This was six years ago. They have been put back in service by late 2017.
Thanks for clarifying
nope. Some of them went into service during 2018 because of the good economy, but during trump’s trade war, they all went back into storage due to low traffic and now PSR and the pandemic.
Friend of mine that works for UP said they've been moving units out of there the last couple of months.
That was a very professional video. Good job. Music was an outstanding choice.
excellent job, our farm has a track running through the middle and it has miles of coal cars in storage for past six months
They will add to it now that biden will take office in January.
@@PalpatineExOrder66 The total US production of coal dropped by more than 21% in the first three years of the Trump administration, and I'm sure it will be down even further in 2020. The economics of energy are agnostic to politics, renewables aren't going to stop becoming cheaper and more efficient.
@@cliffdavis Renewables are comparatively anything but efficient, what? You can't power the world on "renewables'.
@@ut000bs You can power the world on non-renewables until they're gone.
Ha, I just noticed it this weekend on my way to Phoenix from Texas.
Hard to imagine, 20yrs ago when the locomotives were built, we manufactured enough in this country to keep those engines busy. Now our trade deficit with China is so huge and growing it's not even reported on the news. .
Well done voting Biden in office
Thanks to globalization.
Nice vid!
I'm no expert, but I'd love to see more federal programs that incentivize railroads to overhaul existing locomotives rather than forcing them to buy new Tier whatever-it-is-today locos. At worst, we're talking about 1,000,000 horsepower not in use and 63,000 tons of unused metal that loses value every day from one Class I hauler at one site. At a glance, these are older SD70s and Dash 8 or 9s, so these aren't ancient units. The numbers probably don't work out for the biz, but from a regulatory standpoint, more can be done to reduce overall waste, not solely focused on fuel savings and emissions.
Union Pacific is slowly rebuilding their C44-9W's into AC4400CW's.
They are scattered at GE in Justin and Fort Worth Texas.I seriously doubt that the C40-8W's will ever be rebuilt,even though there has been discussion,if any are still awaiting in storage.Union Pacific sold most of their C41-8's years ago to Canadian National which actually still have them active.
CSX & BNSF are the only two Class 1's that have given prolonged usage to the -8's with BNSF still having a handful of B40-8W's and CSX keeping their CW40-8's.
Union Pacific recently has decided to put nearly all of their SD70M's in storage or scrap them either way.The only units that won't be tampered with are SD70M's still under warranty.The only modern EMD units that still have some time left on them are the SD70ACE's.GE rebuild programs are far more common because of better software and overall technological advancements.Not to mention easier on emissions testing since all of those units are four stroke.Modern EMD units have been more expensive to both rebuild and maintain over the years,nearly all of them end up in storage once age hits the mark and lesser rebuild programs have been taking place over time.EPA regulations killed EMD and discontinued the 710 series for the SD70 variants because of it's higher carbon footprint and not upholding into tier four compliance.EMD had to retrofit thousands of units with exhaust manifold silencers to bypass this.
The ET44AH's have actually managed to be better on efficiency and great pullers due to higher tractive effort like most GE units,much like the ES44AC's.
The SD70AH-T4's were failed from the start.Ironically,they flopped just like the SD90MAC's that they were based on.Union Pacific still owns 100 of them but CSX finally got ridden of the 10 ST70AH-T4's and gave them back to PRLX.They are heavily disliked by many crews.
Norfolk Southern,Kansas City Southern,and BNSF had their leases of SD70AH-T4's years ago but weren't satisfied at all and canceled any order requests.
However,all of the PRLX SD70AH-T4's more recently have ended up as leased units to Ferromex in Mexico for the time being...
@@Slim_Slid that’s great info! I appreciate it! Good to know there are plans for a great deal of them.
@@ddthompson42
No problem.I also forgot to mention about the certain amount of SD60M's that are still active but were rebuilt into SD59MX's for usage and regulations in California.SD60M's have been in storage for a long time now.Although a handful of SD60's have remained on the roster as yard and local units only.
It's urgent, we need that one in the middle.
Nice editing. Good production value. Enjoyed your video.
That would be quite a scene to model, BUT, even in HO scale a scale mile is a tick over 61 1/2 feet. Might have to do a bit of selective compression.
Awesome footage.
It does make you wonder what the line was originally built for. Hard to imagine it was just to store engines!
It was the original main line. ADOT wanted to replace the Railroad overpass over I10 because it was too low. ADOT, AZ State and UP came up with a plan and now the new main line runs along I10 on the north side. Right now all these units are gone but we have a Ballast Train in there.
Tell us more about the underground trail entrances down there near this place...!
Should be double tracked with crossovers at regular intervals to enable pulling certain units for production, to sell or for scrapping. Reminds me of a commercial aircraft boneyard.
Exactly. Davis Monthan for the UP. Corrosion control in the dessert. Secure due to isolated location. Zero storage fees. Same thing the air force does.
that's a lot of power.... some of these look brand new
Man that's honestly just sad to see. Especially seeing that CNW patch loco mixed in there tells you most of em have been there a while 😢
No wonder in early 2020 I could see UP locomotives in British Columbia pulling Canadian trains. When the Canadian railroads got a huge surge of demand for both grain and oil hauling at the same time. UP managers were probably saying words like "What do you mean you only want 50 locomotives" Or whatever number were requested.
Well made video and graphics, thank you for posting.
Keith Dobie thank you
They've started to pull these out now
Best place to store them I suppose, dry environment...
Big drop in coal demand has caused a lot of storage. Watched a video just a few days ago of hundreds of BNSF locomotives in storage in the Powder River Basin. Oill traffic could be the next to go. :-(
Being 4.3 miles it’s up as one of the longest trains (or string of engines) with the longest train ever being 4.57 miles
Wow all on a single track.
I saw this back in August heading back to Albuquerque.
NO wonder we can't get enough power to go over the damn mountain
Many EMD SD60M's built in the 1990's - the GE Dash 8's about that old too.
Yes dash 8 s were introduced in 1990 and SD60Ms in 1989.
Thanks.
Probably not as many but there's a couple of big long strings of them in Nampa Idaho.
So UP is using the Arizona Desert like the US Military AMARG @ Davis Monthan AFB in Tuscon does. Interesting seeing 300+ engines in a continuous line.
A lot of them come up to Canada for the winter. Help CP make it up all the mountain grade. But we still end up stalling 😂
*looks at title and expects a yard and sheds*
*gets a 4.3 mile-long train of locomotives*
Nice video! Massive land
For such a "LONG" line of locomotive's you keep showing the same section over and over again.
Thanks, Rudy - EXACTLY my thought
There used to be one in tyler, texas as a kid i watched them.
The land around them looks like a RATTLESNAKE FACTORY!
it is
scottystiffchicken I live here in central Arizona. The number of rattle snakes depends on the number of mice, rats, ground squirrels, pack rats available for them to eat. My guess is about a hundred rattlers per acre under the right conditions in unpopulated areas. You can look right at a rattler and not see it because their skin color is almost an exact match to their surroundings. There are even rattle snakes that live in trees. Arizona is perfect for rattlers, not so much for people.
Good...Helps to detour vandalism.
nice drone footage
Jan. 2018----Thanks for the video.....copied it so I can use it in a story I started about 5 years ago.
Wow, what a sight!
Great video !
I see these all the time driving on I-10.
In a similar fashion as a child, I witnessed endless steam Locos being taken to South Wales for breaking, must have been about 1965 - 70. Fortunately here in Britain we have a strong Steam following, and loads of Locos have been preserved.
They're all gone now. This stretch of siding was the mainline before they rerouted it and put in a stretch that was much straighter
OMG, I saw a CNW DASH 9-44CW in that mix. I noticed that most of the fleet is older 1990 era and before models. They are not Tier I-IV compatiable. If any were to return to service, they would be rebuilt to at least Tier II standards. If not then these units are heading to Class II or short line owners. Worst yet, some or most would be scrapped.
Best case is for these to be sold to short lines, a lot of these units would be costly for UP to upgrade, a short line could use thes Dash 8s and 9s very well, and those MAcs would also be useful aswell, if UP actually wants to make a profit, selling them would be the best bet
Union Pacific is actually rebuilding their C44-9W's into C44ACM's.There is many fleets of them lined up at GE in Justin and Forth Worth Texas.The SD70M's are finally being retired.The oldest of the units and/or with the highest usage are getting scrapped.Brownsville Texas has been getting them delivered in bunches for scrap values.The units were lesser hours and use on them will be put into storage like they've done to every single series on their roster.The only SD70M's that will remain active and not messed with are the units still under warranty.
Before retirement was official,some shortlines and programs were purchasing SD70M's in large numbers and dirt cheap because of how ragged and beat up they have been for years.
Most shortlines won't take any GE units,there is very few with -8's and rarely any with -7's still running and hardly some are starting to get retired -9's.
EMD units on shortlines or even Class 2's are 10/1 due to costs and widespread distribution or resources.
The only reason why Class 1's have hugely surpassed owning GE units versus any remaining EMD units (GP40-2's & SD40-2's not included) is because of EPA regulations and technological advancements.Not to mention the mainteance and problematics that alot of modern EMD units come with,and CAT/PRLX made it worse in my opinion.Also,on a quick note to the other guy,Union Pacific never owned any SD70MAC's...
There is barely any T2 units around because most are all T3 if not T4.
EMD discontinued production because of emissions testing and got their reputation ruined by CAT/PRLX.
This is also why thousands of units have exhaust manifold silencers on them.
Ok IK a lot of people see this so I’ll tell you all this
Back in August UP began to pull power from storage back into service and then most of those dash 8s got sold or scrapped as for the dash 9s and sd60s I’ve been seeing countless units going back into service so don’t worry to much most of the units shown here have either been sold, scrapped, or back into service
VERY professionally made video! As good as any Hollywood production. Appearing like it,too.
Passing by last week, it looked like some units have been removed on the east end of the cut. There is no rail access on the west end of this track anymore. The locomotives started going in there in 2015. All are defueled and have caps on their exhaust. UP has a subcontract security monitoring the equipment, plus ground cameras. This is not a open petting zoo. You will be prosecuted, if caught trespassing. Treat this as any other railroad property and respect it as such. This line was part of the Lordsburg Sub mainline and was straightened on the north side of I-10. The west end went over I-10 and was deemed dangerous for vehicle travel, so it was rerun north of the interstate.
That CNW patch is being preserved!
Some of those Dash-8s have been sold already
BNSF Fan 7695 Including the wide-nose cab variants?
Would make a great boarder wall
I'm curious how old these are. In the early 70's I worked for the Erie G.E. plant where they used to build locomotives. I imagine that section was moved to Texas.
Justin and Fort Worth Texas have General Electric plants which is where alot of their rebuild programs are.
Good portions of those units in the video are GE C44-9W's and EMD SD70M's or SD60M's which date back to the 1990's.
The SD60M's go back to the 1980's.
The SD60M's have all been gone and in storage for a couple of years now.Alot of them were scrapped and/or sold.Any of the surviving units that were given prolonged usage were rebuilt as SD59MX's for emissions regulations and remain for service in California.
There is a handful of SD60's at that still on the roster but they are only used as yard and local power.Just like GP40-2's and SD40-2's.
Union Pacific is rebuilding the C44-9W's as C44ACM's so those will stay around for awhile just like the AC6000CW's that were also rebuilt.Currently the SD70M's are finally being retired.Most of them having high end use and hours are getting scrapped but units with less problems are being put into storage.
There is consists of them awaiting to be scrapped in Brownsville Texas.
Even before getting retired some shortlines and programs acquired them dirt cheap in good numbers because of how beat up they were.Just like when Norfolk Southern purchased SD9043MAC's from Union Pacific and some from CEFX to rebuild as SD70ACU's.Most of them had cracks in the frame.Norfolk Southern sooner than later sold off half of what they got to PRLX and now they are being scrapped.
The only SD70M's that aren't being removed are units still under warranty.
I live not far from where these Locomotives were sitting, that's right, they are not here anymore. I am curious where they went.
probably back to work
Back to work or scrapped.
Awesome video
frankpierce2008 thank you. It was fun to film it. Some drama at times but fun.
I believe most of these are not CARB compliant power units and are also D/C power. Just like the Air Force bone yard south of Tucson AZ is a great place to keep unit till needed or rebuilt.
CARB compliant? I was under the impression the railroads told California to stuff that in their ears.
If they haven't, they should!
Yeah those reasons make sense and I know coal traffic is down too. UP is smart to store them out in the Desert since they will hold up okay for future usage or to be sold off.
Piss on California. CARB is the reason why Caterpillar stopped manufacturing engines for highway use. The representative told us they jjust couldn't meet their demands. The demands of people who claim cow farts contribute to global warming.
Hello from Kansas 🇺🇸
Very nice! : )
I hope the mechanics added some biobore to the fuel tanks in each locomotive to prevent algae growth. I’m sure if any were to be summoned back to service that the shop has a checklist of items to review prior to putting back into the operational fleet.
These locomotives are sitting on a spur off the Union Pacific Lordsburg Subdivision southeast of Tuscon Arizona.
Would you happen to know how long that spur has been there. Watching the drone footage, it looked to me like the ballast was brand new, as if that spur was put in specifically to store those loco's.
Thanks, UP veteran, Roseville Locomotive Facility
@@ET_Don The spur was actually an old alignment of the south track on the subdivision at one time. They may have installed new ballast on the spur so it would hold up to the weight of the locomotives. At this time that is all I have concerning the spur. If I get more information or if this is in error I will soon correct.
Between Vail and Mescal on Google maps, saw the split at the curve. Near US 10
@@Blargaldalien Actually that is I-10.
Ha, the Snowpiercer commercial came on while I was watching this.
And I can’t forget 2010 & 7400 as well
Hi all, happy thanks giving, OK so does anyone have an update to this wonderful but sad sight/ anything good or bad ? thanks - Ian -- UK.
Great video..suggestion, slow the drone down take a reel showing the locomotive numbers and the tops of each.
Hundreds more locomotives will be sidelined on other railroads as well as they all start to embrace precision scheduled railroading.
I bet there’s some C40-8’s C40-8W’s C41-8W’s SD60’s SD60M’s & SD70M’s and maybe some AC44’s 2002 included in the storage
You would think UP would rotate those engines with all the active engines.
A sitting loco , car, truck, ect... is the worse thing one can do to a machine. Rust, mices, the weather will destroy any sitting machine
That's why they are in AZ. Limited moisture. Outside of the UV damage on the paint. They shouldn't really have issues. I'd wager they do come out and turn them over once In awhile.
As of Q1, UP has over 1,400 locomotives in storage due to decrease in demand, compared to the 475 last year this time.
Richard Beers really they have pulled a huge amount from storage and sold over 300 units since last summer
Beginning of the video says Union Pacific engine yard. This is just a single track of 300 lashed up locomotives.
I'm guessing it used to be a main line that overtime got so little demand that up turned it into basically a 1 track engine storage yard
Most of these locomotives may never run in revenue service for one reason: they don’t meet even EPA Tier 2 emission standards.
Should sell some off to south America, Asia or Africa. They dont have near the environmental standards we do here in north America and in Europe or Australia. Let these big boys work again. But instead theyre left to rust.
@@ralphvelthuis2359 not that simple as all tracks have their own gauge standards which is potentially different to USA.
@@johnpodo north America uses standard gauge. Although there are some countries that use narrow gauge, or their own specific gauge for their country, there are close to 20 3rd world countries in those 3 continents that use standard gauge, as well as some 2nd world countries. Plus some of the island Caribbean countries also use standard gauge, plus Mexico, and none of them have the restrictive standards faced by American and Canadian railroad companies.
@@ralphvelthuis2359Whether the trains are fit for a country will depend less in track gauge but on loading gauge. All those locks would fit on UK rail track, after all that's where standard track gauge came from, but the first tunnel or station and there are problems as the UK loading gauge is a lot smaller (one of the problems of being first).
@@ianhodgson5577 : Correct. Loading gauge issues are a huge reason why freight rail in Europe isn't nearly as extensive as it is in the US, among other reasons. Plate H is literally a pipe dream there in many places.
Must be safe to assume all those engines are up to date on maintenance.
Poor share holders, all that motive stock sitting doing nothing.
They still have to be maintained though, machines are made to RUN, not sit doing nothing.
They are in long term storage so they don't have to be maintained and are taken off the books.
Those trains would sit around for 50 years and a mechanic could get them running in like 3 hours I work on these things everyday they're so basic there's not much to them and they're built to last you probably have to fix a couple of wires and the thing would run like a top
Would love to see them break out 300 MU cables and have a 150 vs 150 tug of war!
They have another storage yard in Utah I believe.
Well BNSF has about 800 SD70MACs and 100 AC4400CWs idled parked. only very few of them running along with gevos and aces.
Insane !
It would cost a very large fortune to equip these with modern PTC equipment. They cycle these in & out of use or eventually sell them to short lines or for scrap. Currently we’re resurrecting some Dash 9 locos. They are also not as efficient as more modern units. I’m an electrical tech for UP. Don’t worry - UP is making plenty of money & just got a 6 billion dollar tax cut. BTW we’re not getting thousand dollar bonuses either.
They don't meet the new emission standards. Some will be upgraded some not
I wonder how many of them are now a wonderful new home to some of the various desert critters? I can see it when they pull a couple out of line, drag them to a yard and have a mechanic come face to face with a rattle snake, or have a scorpion climb on him for a better view? Or find the ground squirrel colony who has been happily eating all the wires insulation. It might be a pretty good show when the africanized bees take issue to people moving around their pretty big hive. Yep, having been born and raised in these desert areas, I see a potential for minor little issues like when a ticked off yellow jacket nest come screaming out of the exhaust on first light off. I think it might be fun to grab a cold one and a lawn chair and watch the show, from a safe distance of course. Have fun!
I remember seeing this about a year ago
I wonder what the oldest engine in the lot is. A few of them toward the dog leg looked pretty old. Great video.
If they stood like this somewhere in the former soviet union, they would be gone in mere months, simply disassembled by locals and moved to metal yards. First copper and aluminum, then steel.
Here in Detroit they wouldn't last a week
If there's someone badass enough to go out into the middle of the dessert in a place not accessible by car and up a steep embankment to take a locomotive apart and haul away parts that weigh over 2000lbs (most of it steel) just for scrap they deserve it.
@@242bleek There was a truck in the video, so it is accessible. I would think they would have a guard in a truck patrolling the area.
@@bigredc222 he would have his share.
@@wwlb4970 I was working on a construction site in a bad area, after a few weeks nothing had been stolen, but they decided they should hire a security guard just to be safe. The first night the security guard was on duty we got robbed, I think we got robbed the next two or three more times with him on duty, they fired him and got a new guy, we never got robbed again.
Very nice and different video. I am surprised to see all the locomotives lined up on one track. Must be difficult to get parts / complete locomotive, if it is "down the line". Also, as another viewer has mentioned, why don't they cover openings etc? Greetings fra Denmark /Adam
There are so many crazy things around the World...!😢😢😮
Absolutely astonishing Breathtaking, I was floored WOW.