Flooding in NC / TN (was on the Clinchfield)

[yellowdog]

You could argue that. But as someone who used to live there, a bridge made a lot more sense when there were 20+ trains a day, lots of gridlocked trains trying to get in and out of the yard, and switching crews constantly shuffling cars around (with switching crews being 10-20 cars out of sight of the crossings, and making regular reversing moves back and forth across the crossing in question). I don't see 5-8 trains (plus no switching crews) as that big of a deal for this crossing, especially given that there are many other grade crossings in the area.

Otherwise, I agree--time will tell as the area become more accessible in the coming weeks, but I'm doubtful. It's currently the only line in CSX's system marked as "long-term outage."

[ossie]

Thanks for the extra info yellowdog, much appreciated! If you drew a line from Chicago down to Houston, RR-wise I know a bit about what happens west of it, but to the east I know very little. That said, Clinchfield is a name I'm very familiar with so it's quite a surprise to realise how downgraded operations on the line have become. Are there viable alternative routes in the area? With the damage bill they'll be facing, I'd imagine they'll be looking very hard at other options if it's only carrying 5-7 trains per day.

As an aside, here in Melbourne we're approaching the end of a years long level crossing removal project with 100(ish) crossings on our suburban rail system being put under or over major roads. Knowing the sort of waiting times/traffic snarls you guys can experience with the size of your trains, I've always been a bit amused to hear people here ranting about having to spend 5 or so minutes sitting at a crossing waiting for a couple of our commuter trains to clear a section. If we'd had to cope with freight trains doing some shunting/switching as well, we might have gone into a gridlock induced panic and just closed down. 😊

[landnrailroader]

Hard is a understatement. As a retired CSX guy, I have serious doubts that we will ever see the Clinchfield intact again. NS is in the same boat with their line along the French Broad downstream from Asheville, and I heard this morning that Asheville was only accessible by helicopter. The two rail lines are aboth secondary with little traffice so??

[yellowdog]

Early reports are saying 40 miles of the Blue Ridge Subdivision are damaged/destroyed. 40 miles is about 15% of the old Clinchfield, and about 30% of the modern-day Blue Ridge Sub. That's a pretty substantial percentage. And it's difficult terrain: bridges (I just went back and counted from the track profile and I'm seeing 12 bridges), tunnels, fills... The only way in to some of those areas was by railroad or small boat. The railroad is obviously impassible, and the water will have to recede before water transit will be viable (and even then it will be hazardous with all the debris/pollution). So it will still be some time before we know the extent of the damage.

All of the online scanner/repeaters in the area are currently down, so I can't tell if traffic is moving on other parts of the line. Some of the traffic is internal, like the merchandise locals or coal going from the mines in Virginia (and points west) to Duke Power. Those can't be rerouted. But there are viable re-routes for some of the through traffic (i.e. product going to the eastern coast). The Clinchfield has connections on the north end with former C&O (CSX), Southern (NS), and N&W (NS) lines (which connected to former L&N (CSX)), and connections on the south end with former SCL (CSX), ACL (CSX), and Southern (NS) lines. CSX's service bulletin says the line is clear from Spartanburg, SC to Marion, SC. Marion, SC is not anywhere near the former Clinchfield, so maybe it means Marion, NC (which is on the former Clinchfield). If it's Marion, NC, they can probably get coal to Duke from the south.

Here's a snippet of the track profile (showing elevation), from Erwin, TN (where the damage begins) to Marion, NC. The reports I've seen are only talking about the areas between Erwin and Spruce Pine, NC (where the water was close to 10 feet above the railhead). The area between Altapass and Marion are the famous Loops. I haven't seen anything yet about their condition.

[ossie]

Hi Jerry and yellowdog. I was looking at some drone footage from around Asheville last night and while I didn't (couldn't??) see much of the tracks, the number of major washouts on the roads I saw told enough of a story of what a huge rebuild they have in front of them. Large scale flooding isn't uncommon here but one of the worst I've seen was a decade or so back in similar circumstances in hill/valley country. As bad as the flooding was, the limited road and rail links into those sort of communities means once they're cut even basic recovery like getting the power back on or getting clean drinking water in gets a lot more difficult than in flatter country with more road options. Some of what I watched last night was quite unbelievable and even the future of the RR aside, you have to wonder how people pick up and recover from something that catastrophic.

[yellowdog]

Here's a site with some before-and-after shots of the River Arts District of Asheville (along the French Broad River) that show the NS line completely under water:

https://www.citizen-times.com/story/news/local/2024/10/01/before-and-after-photos-asheville-nc-river-arts-district/75467757007/

The NS A-Line scanner is up and working today, with what sounds like normal road chatter. The A-Line runs from Knoxville TN to Bristol VA, and the repeater is in Jonesboro, TN. This line is north and west of the major flooding, but does run through Greeneville, TN. The Nolichucky River (which did all the damage to the Clinchfield) flows into Greeneville, and ultimately through the Nolichucky Dam. There were fears that the dam would fail in the aftermath of the storm, leaving widespread flooding below. The dam held, but a news article blurb says it's estimated the dam withstood nearly twice the flow of Niagra Falls. A buddy of mine was whitewater kayaking on the Nolichucky a few days before the flooding. The CFS was running at 1200 when he was on the river. Some estimates put the CFS as high as 160,000 during the height of the disaster.

[yellowdog]

From the CSX Service Announcement dated 10/2/2024

• The Blue Ridge Subdivision has suffered extensive damage, with two bridges washed out and no estimated time for reopening.