NORFOLK SOUTHERN SAFETY TRAIN

This afternoon, just after 2:00 PM a brightly painted train rumbled past our house. I had never before seen a train like this one. An internet search revealed that this was the Norfolk Southern Safety Train.

Norfolk Southern’s Operation Awareness and Response program was launched in 2015 in order to enhance working partnerships with local first responders by delivering classroom, web-based, and field training sessions to better equip them to deal with incidents involving hazardous materials and rail operations.

The Norfolk Southern hazmat safety train is a 2,000-horsepower, 273-ton locomotive in livery sporting the insignia of police, fire, and emergency services. It has two boxcars which have been converted into classrooms with a capacity for 30 people, four styles of tank cars (DOT-105, DOT-111, DOT-112, and DOT-1) to train first responders in various car valves and fittings, and two 89-foot flatcars which transport intermodal containers.

Seeing this train moving down the tracks behind our home was quite a Sunday afternoon sight. Here is a brief video for those who missed it coming through Spartanburg.