I had to go into work late this morning because of a doctor’s appointment. Of course, the trip from the doctor’s office to work had the scanner scanning away on the dash of the car. In Franklin, CT I caught something different from the norm – a New England Central Railroad job working south of Willimantic during the daylight hours. And a bit later on, and closer to work, not only brought the rain, but also something different on the Thames River.
As I was heading south on Route 32 in Franklin, my scanner came alive with human voices on the NECR channel. Sounded like a train was doing some work at the Cargill feed plant. Since it was on my way into work, I figured I’d check it out.
Yep, a NECR train was switching the Cargill facility – NECR train 608 was working south of Willimantic this morning. I got there as they were finishing up switching Cargill and getting ready to head south towards New London. Here’s a few shots of the train on the runaround.
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As I got the last shot, I felt a couple drops of rain hit me – looks like they deluge the weather folks were predicting was beginning. So I headed for the car and continued my commute into work.
With the scanner still on, and hoping for a run-in with Providence & Worcester train NR-2, I got off of I-395 onto Route 2A and headed across the Thames River to Route 12, which parallels the P&W Norwich Branch all the way to Groton. All the way south I heard nothing from NR-2, making me wonder where they were at. As I passed the USS Nautilus in Groton, I got my answer – they just called that they were south of MP12 and about 20 minutes from the sub base. Oh, well, NR-2 wasn’t in the cards today. But just then, the Amtrak bridges frequency came alive – there was some talk about a Navy vessel heading for the drawbridge. Interesting – I’ll have to check it out. So I headed for the overlook just south of the drawbridge to see what I could see.
As I passed over Fairview Yard I got a peek of something unusual – a large boxy structure on what looked like a barge was being pushed by a tugboat towards the drawbridge. Moments later I got to my spot and saw the US Navy’s YRBM-L-40, what I found out later to be a repair, berthing and messing barge. Apparently it’s used to house the ship’s crew while work is done on the vessel at sea. Anyways, here’s a few shots of her heading south through the drawbridge. Of course the rain started picking up in earnest at this point.
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Looking to the south, I saw a lumber ship, the Saga Adventure, was moored at the State Pier in New London, making an interesting photo.
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Then I sprinted south a bit further to get ahead of her and snap a couple more shots. And the rain came down even harder at this point.
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Of course, I had to get a bow on shot of the Saga Adventure
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And my favorite of the bunch – the barge continuing south, with the US Coast Guard’s tall ship Eagle shrouded in fog and rain in the background.
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At that point I was pretty well drenched. Luckily I had a stack of napkins in the car so I could begin to dry off before I had to go to work a couple minutes later. After drying off a bit, and of course drying off the camera first, I headed down to the parking lot to the south and stayed within the dry confines of my office for the remainder of the day.
Thanks for looking!
Tom
