Worcester & Willimantic at Night

This past Saturday night, Bob LaMay and I braved the wind & rain, and headed up to Worcester for a little night photo session.  Up there, we met up with a few other photographers, and proceeded to take a few shots before the rain really started to come down.  And on the way home, Bob & I managed to get a few shots in Willimantic, again, as the rain was coming down.

Just as we got to Worcester to meet up with Nick Palazini, Josh Oparowski and Josh Moldover, the wind kicked up, and was mixed with some light rain.  Well, it could be worse, and since we did just travel an hour, we broke out the gear and started shooting.  So we took a few shots around the area, mixing ambient and Lumedyne light.  First up we took a couple shots of the P&W’s rarely used GE 25 ton switcher, #150.

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Then a look across the way at the P&W’s Polar Express train, sitting and waiting until Sunday’s run

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And finally, an artsy view of one of the P&W’s B-units sitting by the fuel pad

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By then, Josh O checked the radar, and it looked like a pretty heavy line of storms were heading our way.  So we decided to call it a night and head home.

Almost home in Willimantic, we were crossing over the Frog Bridge, and as all good railfans do, we looked into the NECR yard.  What we saw was a trio of lights crossing the Willimantic River – the NECR’s south end job (NERWNE or 608) was heading out of the yard.  OK, we really couldn’t get them anywhere, but usually when they’re leaving, so is the Palmer turn (NERWPA or 610).  So we headed over to Bridge Street to check things out.

As we got out of the car by the crossing, we could see another train sitting on the P&W lead.  A few minutes later, they began to pull towards us – it was 610, and they were pulling the P&W interchange out.

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Then they shoved back into the yard to grab the rest of their train.  As the power went past, I got a pan shot of them going by the CERM sign (with Bob right in front of it).

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And non-panning blur shot of them shoving back through the crossing.

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Then as they were preparing to head back north, a shot just struck me.  So I swapped to the telephoto, took a quick guess at the settings, held my breath and took this shot.  Yep, handheld this shot – they were about to move north, so I didn’t have time to get the tripod set up, or even grab the monopod out of the back seat.  Just enoug time to swap lenses, adjust the settings and shoot…

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I kinda like the feel of it – kinda spooky…

And that was it.  As we watched the train head north, we climbed back into the car and headed home.

Thanks for looking!
Tom