(The following story by Thomas Ryll appeared on the Columbian website on January 9.)
VANCOUVER, Wash. — The Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railway’s thousands of miles of track slice through some of the most inhospitable terrain in the country.
Locomotive-size snowdrifts that dare to block the tracks in Montana and North Dakota don’t stand a snowball’s chance in Helena against BNSF’s monster plows.
But early Thursday, Clark County’s relatively unspectacular weather caused major aggravation as trees, some of them nearly 6 feet in diameter, fell by the dozens on BNSF’s north-south line between Felida and Ridgefield, closing the tracks to all freight and passenger trains.
Crews chainsawed more than 60 victims into submission in preparation for opening one of two sets of BNSF tracks Thursday afternoon. But just as the “all clear” signal was about to be issued, another tree fell with a thunderous crash.
“We could not keep up with the trees,” said Gus Melonas, BNSF spokesman in Seattle, shortly after the first set of tracks reopened at about 12:30 p.m. Thursday, freeing an Amtrak train that had been sitting in Vancouver. “It got so bad that the minute one tree was cleared, two more trees fell down.”
Later in the day, the second set of tracks was cleared, but it was reserved for a crane and other cleanup equipment, left in place lest more problems occur. Even so, “We anticipate that the majority of trees have already fallen,” said Melonas.
Ground zero
As trees died and ice continued to clog railroad-track switches by the hundreds, Clark County became BNSF’s snowstorm ground zero. Veteran railroad maintenance workers reported the worst conditions in 25 years or more.
On Wednesday, there were so many frozen switches that no freight cars were moved onto or off customers’ tracks in Vancouver, Portland and Longview, said Melonas.
“For the first time in the memory of many longtime employees, the terminals were shut down,” he said.
In areas where winter weather is routinely vicious, BNSF installs heating equipment to automatically de-ice switch gear.
But severe icing is fairly rare even in the Columbia River Gorge, so most switches go unheated.
With this week’s weather, “There are no conditions that are worse, and there are more switches than employees,” said Melonas.
The process of unsticking the stuck has been long and laborious.
The solution was nothing more sophisticated than a torch or a standard-issue railroad broom, fitted with a chisel tip on the handle end.
Operating instructions: (1) Pry apart icebergs plugging switchgear with chisel tip. (2) Swear. (3) Sweep loose material. (4) Hope for rapid onset of 40-degree temperatures.
Icy road conditions have made it difficult for BNSF to mobilize train crews in many areas. In the gorge, locomotives shuttled some train crews. Even maintenance workers were transported switch-to-switch by locomotives.
Melonas said Amtrak and freight service were moving Thursday afternoon.
“Service between Seattle and Portland is operating,” said Sarah Swain, Amtrak spokeswoman in Oakland, Calif. “We’re looking a lot better than yesterday, just sporadic debris on the tracks causing delays but it hasn’t stopped any service.”
Swain said passengers could make it from Los Angeles to Seattle OK, but north of Everett passengers would have to ride buses instead of trains because of slides.
(Columbian staff writer Amy McFall Prince contributed to this story.)