The NS F-units and OCS on the Waterlevel route

[E.M. Bell]

My admiration for the NS Executive F-units is by now not a big secret, and I have went to some extremes to shoot them whenever I can. Two weeks ago, Carmon and myself spent almost 20 hours on a "death march" chasing them across Three states, and now, I can add state number 6 that I have shot them in thanks to a bit of good luck this past weekend.

We had been planning for a month or more to go up to Fort Wayne Indiana on August 21st to the open house the FWRHS was having, mostly just to see the NKP  765 again. Thanks to info on JREB and a couple of other places,   I knew the NS OCS was heading for Chicago, but it seemed they would be across Ohio and Indiana this past Friday. As luck would have it (and bad luck for the NS) one of the units had some serious traction motor issues near Pittsburgh PA, and that delayed the train over 24 hours. They Left Pittsburgh with only 3 of the F units, and 4 cars.  

After spending the morning shooting the 765 from every angle known to man, we met up with a friend from the area and headed North to the former NYC/Conrail line across Northern Indiana (The Chicago Line). With word the train was out of Toledo and bearing down on us quickly, we found a good spot at Waterloo Indiana , just West of the Amtrak station, and waited in the pouring rain. Just before the OCS arrived, the rain let up and the light got a little better, allowing us one chance to shoot the Westbound OCS under a classic NYC style signal bridge.  There was no chasing him this time, you just cant keep up on that line, so we had to make the best of what we had.  

Here are Two images of the 955 as they rocket through Waterloo...we managed to shoot a hot NKP Berk, and then the OCS in the span of about 4 hours, that's pretty good in my book! Watch for more pics from the trip in the next few days.  

High Resolution versions of these can be found at my Pbase site.  

http://www.pbase.com/kd4jsl/2010ocs