A Dangerous Railroad

It's 9:45 PM and well into the blue hour as a pair of SD70MACs wheel a 67 car and mile long 120N train of solid COFC from the port of Whittier northbound to Anchorage. The train is curling along Turnagain Arm at about MP 84 with Bird Point jutting out in the distance and the snow capped Kenai Mountains rising beyond.

This stretch of track along the Bird Flats has the look and feel of a heavy duty lower 48 Class 1 with deep ballast, concrete ties, and 141 pound welded rail. That's because it is among the newest on the railroad having been built in 2004 as part of a two year long and nearly $20 million Alaska DOT&PF project that straightened this stretch of the Seward Highway, widened it to four lanes, and moved both it and the railroad 60 feet or more west out into Turnagain Arm. This project was accomplished by blasting a massive chunk of the hillside out at Bird Creek three miles to the north and hauling some two million tons of it here in side dump gondolas during the summer of 2003.

Most importantly it got both the highway and railroad away from the treacherous avalanche zone along the Bird Flats and reduced the risk of a major avalanche reaching the road by 85% by adding distance and a large 'catch basin' at the foot of the slope. This terrible stretch of road and rail cost a railroader his life only a few years before this project was undertaken. 53 year old Kerry Brookman, a 21 year ARRC veteran lost his life in February 2000 due to a slide here. Brookman, a heavy equipment operator, was helping highway crews clear an avalanche from the road when a second one came down. Brookman, operating a bulldozer, was working with two other state highway bulldozer operators when it unexpectedly hit, and his 35,000-pound D6 Caterpillar was carried about 400 feet into Turnagain Arm, its cab crushed. To read more about this terrifying tragedy click this link.  As a small memorial and to ensure his name isn't forgotten the railroad renamed the siding two miles south of here 'Brookman' in his honor.

Bird Flats
South of Anchorage, Alaska
Thursday July 24, 2008