Any Amtrak or RR Stories of the 1970's Blizzards?

Does anyone have any Amtrak Stories or RR Stories are ok for that matter form the 1970's Blizzards any thing west of Chicago? I would like to hear them I missed those which was a good thing.

AmtrakFan

I am not sure, AmtrakFan, if you have a specific part of the country in mind when you speek of blizzards during the early 1970's. If you are referring to the northwest, I very much remember a couple of winters from 1970-1972.
I was living in the small hamlet of Browning, Montana, a station stop for the (then) Burlington Northern RR and, of course, later Amtrak.
We had one of the coldest winters, during those 2 years, on record. I did take the train west to Seatle a few times, and I can remember all kinds of problems for the train, due to the severe weather. Snowdrifts could be 20 ft high. I have picture of a neighbor's house with snowdrifts above the roof. He had dug out a tunnel into his front door. With the front porch light on, it resembled an igloo. We had temp readings of minus 40 deg for a few weeks..one one or two occasions it got to 50 below. Many of the local ranchers lost cattle due to the cold weather.
Heading west on the train, from Browning, was Glacier Park..only about 15-20 miles from Browning. I can remember going over some of the tressels, looking down at a gorge 400 ft below the track, and feel the wind (sometimes up to 60 mph) swaying the train, back and forth. Not a comfortable feeling.
Richard

To answer Mr. Richard's Question I mean 1970 to 79 in any part of the Country West of Chicago.

AmtrakFan

I've got several, but they're all about Conrail, from the winter of 1978 -- 1979. Conrail borrowed rotary plows from UP to clear the Water Level Route, and loaded gondolas with snow cleared from Selkirk Yard and sent them to St. Louis (furthest south they could get) and waited for the snow to melt away.

In Buffalo, by Lake Erie, there is a 200-foot-long underpass where the double track mainline to Chicago goes under I-90. It's 25 feet wide and 22 feet high, and after one blizzard it was completely full of snow, wall to wall and floor to ceiling. They couldn't clear it with a rotary, since there was no place to blow the snow. So they dug it out by hand.

And that's my best snow story.