Wednesday, July 7, 2010. There was a special 'Trooper-on-a-Train run from North Little Rock to Marche, Arkansas and back. (Marche is on UP's  Van Buren Sub about 10 miles west of North Little Rock). I got it at Vine Street and Arkansas Blvd in North Little Rock. The special was the SNLNL-7 and consisted of UP 7443, UP crew car MP 3646 (with 6-axle trucks), UP baggage car MP 15082, MoPac red caboose 13064 and trailing locomotive UP 7846. Usually the purpose of a trip like this is to give warning tickets to cars who run past crossing signals (in fact, I got a picture of a car running around downed crossing gates as this train approached). It was not an official Operation Lifesaver event, I was told. Thanks to John C. Jones and a UP employee for the heads up.

CLICK ANY IMAGE TO ENLARGE Or, to view all images in a larger format, click on: http://thundertrain.org/train-070710-special-bb.html

LEFT-The special sits at Vine Street in North Little Rock (at the entrance to UP's NLR yard) at 9:04 a.m. It was a push-pull operation with UP 7846 trailing on the outgoing train. The red Missouri Pacific caboose, No. 13064, was painted at Jenks Shops here about a year ago. RIGHT-The baggage car is MP 15082, the 6-axle passenger/crew car car is MP 3646. These stay in the yards.


LEFT-Here the train approaches the W. 24th Street crossing at 1:23 p.m. just after it left the yard area. You can see the crossing gates lowering. UP 7443 was leading. I'm on Railroad Avenue. RIGHT-Guess what? A car ran around the lowered crossing gates.


UP 7443, MP 3646 (opposite side from my previous photo), MP 15082, MoPac caboose 13064, UP 7846. You can see smoke coming out of a chimney from baggage car MP 15082...food for the riders??


RIGHT-Crossing the overpass of Pershing Blvd.




Here's the MoPac caboose right after it was painted in August 2009.

You may contact me by email - thundertrain@gmail.com - or by using this CONTACT FORM  - If you use the contact form, please be sure to type your email address correctly in the form, otherwise I can't respond. You will also be asked to enter a sequence of letters and numbers to help me try to avoid spammers.  If you want to view more of my train pictures, click on: http://www.trainweather.com/sunday.html    You can also find me on FACEBOOK. If you want to become Facebook friends, send me a direct message when you send your friend request and tell me who you are. I try to  post these same photos and links on Facebook.