The Philadelphia Chapter of the

National Railway Historical Society

Established in 1936

SEPTA R3 West Trenton Train 357, a four car train made up of two ex-Reading Silverliner II's 9001 and 9003 bracketing a pair of ex-Pennsylvania Silverliner II's 252 and 206, tore up the pantographs on the three trailing cars between Woodbourne and Langhorne, with downed wires on Track 1 and 2. The leader 9001 was uncoupled and used as a lifeboat to transport the crew and passengers to Langhorne Station. From 16:00 all outbound trains were turned at Neshaminy with buses used between Neshaminy Falls and West Trenton. Both Bomber sets were returned to Roberts due to the limited space at Neshaminy.

The wire train, which had been on the line earlier in the day for the ongoing wire replacement and maintenance work and had just left the line at 15:00, came back up from Wayne Electric on Track 2. After putting up a barricade 600 feet east of Nesh, the wire train continued east to repair the damage to Track 2, which took about 2 hours. They then pulled east of Wood then down to Woodbourne to pick up a recrew before continuing west of the station to start the work on Track 1. Train 6378 was first through, and work continued the next day until 17:00.

During this time, all CSX trains were held either east at Trent (X551) or west at Nesh (Q174 and X140), and Foreman Hill took the opportunity to fix a broken rail in Woodbourne Yard.

All pictures March 14 2007 Copyright © 2007 John P. Almeida

Photographs for personal use only. All rights reserved by original owner of image. Reproduction or redistribution in any form without express written permission is prohibited.