(Bloomberg News circulated the following article by By Rip Watson on June 17.)
FORT WORTH, Texas — Union Pacific Corp. and Burlington Northern Santa Fe Corp., the two biggest U.S. railroads, said they will ship less coal than usual over a Wyoming track that’s the nation’s busiest shipping route for the fuel.
After May derailments and damage to shared track in the Powder River Basin, “operations are not back to normal,” Union Pacific said on its Web site Thursday. The regular daily average of 63 trains can’t be run “during the foreseeable time period,” the Omaha, Neb.-based railroad said. Union Pacific didn’t say how much shipments will decline or for how long.
Derailments May 14 and 15 interrupted shipments, and moisture from record rain and snow as well as coal dust from passing trains damaged ballast that supports the tracks. In the past four weeks, coal business has fallen 13 percent at Union Pacific and 3 percent at Burlington Northern. Together, they shipped more than 4 million coal loads last year, for $4.7 billion in revenue.
The companies are working on a repair plan to allow resumption of full service on the 107 miles of track.
“Until we have a maintenance plan approved by Union Pacific, we cannot detail what the impact will be,” said Richard Russack, a spokesman for Fort Worth-based Burlington Northern.