Here’s a few pictures from my second day on the Orin Sub in the Powder River Basin.
First, an eastbound loaded UP train passes between two small hills at milepost 95 on the southern part of the line. The head end of the train is crossing one of the few bridges on this subdivision.
This next photo shows the business and activity of the area around Bill. The yard at Bill was originally constructed by the Chicago and Northwestern for their crew and operations base in the area. Since then they have been absorbed by the UP and the BNSF has added a few yard/storage tracks of its own. Here, an eastbound load on Main 3 is leaving town. If you look about 25 cars back, on Main 2 you’ll see another eastbound BNSF load which was also on the move. On Main 1 you can see the DPU of an empty UP train heading west. The yard tracks to the left contain some parked trains. Note the black ex-IC switcher.
These next two shots are of the same train and were taken from the same location (Lawyer Road). I was never able to get an eastbound in decent lighting at this location. Every time I thought I’d get one, to use the words of Grumpy, I got cloudfucked. Here’s two views, coming and going:
The Orin sub is a busy place, and last week I found out that my wife’s sister will be moving within an hour or so of Gillette, so hopefully I have a chance to visit in the coming year.
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