This site features daily historical railroad posts from the Big Bend/Columbia Plateau region of Washington state. As a personal site, this is my online filing cabinet of interesting things I've come across about railroading in the area.
I know it's easy to grab an image from here and post it elsewhere, like Steve Renfrow does, but if you do, could you at least give this site a little credit?
Dan Bolyard
I remember the "white trains" as everyone called them. They even had armed guards in special cars at each end of the train. I was working at Naval Submarine Base Bangor at the time and there were crowds all along the railroad. They had to send a Hi-rail truck ahead to clear people who were laying on the tracks and cutting trees down over the tracks etc. The sheriff followed the route on the roads and arrested people trespassing on the railroad property. Crazy! Even though this was the safest way to transport the materials, they finally gave up transporting in the all white train as it was too obvious and starting shipping in regular looking boxcars and now even ship some via highway (that's real safe, right?!). The protestors think they stopped nuclear shipments but PS&P still hauls nuclear materials to the base today.
2 comments:
I remember the "white trains" as everyone called them. They even had armed guards in special cars at each end of the train. I was working at Naval Submarine Base Bangor at the time and there were crowds all along the railroad. They had to send a Hi-rail truck ahead to clear people who were laying on the tracks and cutting trees down over the tracks etc. The sheriff followed the route on the roads and arrested people trespassing on the railroad property. Crazy! Even though this was the safest way to transport the materials, they finally gave up transporting in the all white train as it was too obvious and starting shipping in regular looking boxcars and now even ship some via highway (that's real safe, right?!). The protestors think they stopped nuclear shipments but PS&P still hauls nuclear materials to the base today.
John, Ephrata
I do recall the big to-do about these trains. I think if folks knew what was being transported, whether by truck or train, they'd not sleep too well.
Dan
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