Bay Ridge Derailment, circa-1966

Here are a few images from my collection of just one of scores of incidents my father had to respond to on the Bay Ridge line. In this case, some poor, misunderstood children, victims of society's harsh rules, and stigmatized by being required to attend school, threw a switch and waited for a freight to come by. The train ran into an abuttment, doing hundreds of thousands of dollars damage to the equipment and line. I don't know if the crew was injured severely. Fortunately, the boys who did this weren't hurt. I hope they got a good scolding for this cute, but naughty, prank!

These shots are amazing. I like seeing the E44s on LI rails. well geographicly LI rails, I mean earth.

Wow, those poor NH rectifyers, ex. Virginian (I think). Was that the end of road for those two or were they rebuilt? Did NH run down to Bay Ridge till the end, the end meaning the merge point of them into Penn Central.

Barry

Ouch!

Glad no one was hurt! What a mess to clean up!

Dave

Hey JJ does this bring back memories?? Put those engines on 2 cripple!!!!!

Great shots. In the first photo showing the boom of a crane, I'm assuming that's a NH crane, correct?

Looks like the pan on the lead unit sure got hurt.

Oh yeah, FWIW, tilting a mercury rectifier over like that tends to damage it, too.

Given the New Haven's finances back then, I'm amazed they didn't just abandon the units on the spot, though I guess the E33 was decent enough at pulling a train.

Note the jumper between the two motors - which makes me wonder if the lead unit's pan was like that for a while prior...

There are two E44 rectifiers left, I believe. One is in Virginia Museum of Transportation, the other tucked away in storage in Connecticutt. I have seen the Virginia unit, and it looks great in original colors.

Yes, that is a NH crane.

Anyone recognize the location? I have no idea.

The other is in the Valley RR in storage, still in CR colors..

Where does the valley RR co have the other E44? I was there in '01 and did not see it or just dont remember is since i was operating steam and could care less bout nething else

LI7285, as you say, "Loose lips sink ships"....it's tucked away-- the E-33 is not on public display, which is why you did not see it.

This location is just (railroad) west of Brooklyn College. This is where the branch went down to two tracks. The garage type structure is where maintenance vehicles for the catenary were stored.

Jay

Malone, Thanks, I knew I did not see it.

Over the time since that wreck, how close has the Bay Ridge been to being closed, and meeting the same fate as the Evergreen? Was there any periods when the Bay Ridge was not in use? I know today it sees enough business, and the pipe dream of using the floats still exists. I guess this has always been the route to the Cross Harbor?

After New Haven got absorbed into Penn Central (the absolute kiss of death) traffic fell off on the Bay Ridge line. Re-routing over old NYC trackage took the place of the car floats. The copper wires were huge source of scrap value and PC started the tear down.