A LIRR DE30ac locomotive is pulling a special, daily shuttle westbound between Long Beach and Lynbrook across the bascule bridge at "LEAD" tower, Reynold's Channel, east of Island Park in November, 2012 in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy. The Long Beach branch is normally a third-rail-powered line, but the diesel shuttle service was put into place as the power had to be cut off to the third rail since so much of the line was under water. (George Povall photo, Dave Keller archive)
The Bascule Bridge is from Florida and was barged up. The Tower is called Lead Tower or simply "Lead", and it controls the tracks between east of Island Park RR Station and into and out of Long Beach yard and also, in conjunction with the Coast Guard and marine band radio, raises and lowers the bridge for marine traffic in Reynold's Channel...the LIRR's LEAD Tower Block Operator controls everything and has a liaison with the Coast Guard when necessary.
Due to the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy, an all-day shuttle service was put into effect.
The train was double ended and had two 400 series diesels, or "DE"s with 4 cars (held about 120 people each) and the track in Long Beach yard was lined and spiked for Station Track No. 6 as the entire train cleared the overhead canopies on the north side of the train.
The shuttle train would originate in Jamaica Storage Yard, go to Lynbrook RR Station, pick everyone up, make all local stops to Long Beach, go into Station Track No. 6 (the only track used all day long) and basically when one train left Lynbrook, another left Long Beach and so on...special train numbers were used (9,000 series numbers) for the electrics and their connecting diesels for both eastbound and westbound service.
In Valley Yard the shuttle would change direction and then go back into the Lynbrook RR Station, pick everyone up and head back to Long Beach.
Both sets of diesels were virtually identical...two 400's and four cars...back and forth all day, with an approximate layover of 30 minutes on either end, with constant MU's feeding the two shuttles every hour. The Long Beach commuters were extremely grateful to have anything at all running to their terminal and we got plenty of good press.
I rode the first day of the shuttle (the second trick portion of course) and rode every shuttle back and forth from 2pm - 10 pm or thereabouts. Very interesting operation and good crews.
They had two Engineers that never "changed ends" and each performed a brake test at each location and were in place and ready to go, so no delays or engine problems...great idea. Info courtesy: Robert L. Myers, LIRR Transportation Manager (Retired)
