Two Rare Finds in Aledo

Ken
April 28, 2021
Blog Posts

Sunday April 25th was a beautiful day with full sun and mild temperatures. I had been advised that BNSF was in the process of replacing a bridge near Alvord on the Wichita Falls Sub. As a result an Alliance Yard to Los Angeles stack train would be using BNSF trackage rights Sunday afternoon from Fort Worth to Sweetwater over the UP Baird Sub near the house. I planned to be in Aledo for the event, and luckily I had all my equipment in the SUV as just before 3:30 pm I received word an eastbound UP intermodal approaching Weatherford had the UP 1943 Veteran’s unit as a mid-train DPU.

I drove straight over to Aledo and at 4:35 pm the UP 8994 along with a second SD70ACe roared up the grade through town.

As evidenced by the two photos above, the afternoon light was favoring westbound trains so I positioned myself for that angle and a minute or two later I could see the 1943 heading towards me. I cropped this first photo closely on the left so as to give the impression there was nothing coupled to the nose end of the unit as it passed the old Bryant grain elevator.

The second photo as the train moves east shows the true circumstances.

There was a westbound merchandise train in the siding at Iona, and at 4:58 pm both the UP 8237 West and local young railfan Luke Meacham showed up at the same time.

A relatively clean single DPU was in dynamic braking as it came by a few minutes later.

I received word the intermodal train was leaving Alliance Yard, so I decided to hang out at the old Iona Depot behind the Aledo city office. Luke and his mom joined me there as the light kept getting lower and better. At 6:30 pm our wait was ended when the BNSF 5615 leading two other units rolled into Aledo. These days BNSF does not use its trackage rights over the UP between Fort Worth and Sweetwater very often. I made this four shot sequence to balance out the train and the Aledo town scenery to give the photos a sense of location.