There was a post about several steam locomotives that were almost buried (UP618, CRI&P938, and AT&SF5030). Did this actually happen to any steamers. I've heard of steam locomotives at the bottom of rivers.

I don't expect to find an NYC J-3 Hudson under the turntable at Harmon, but does anyone here know of any possible candidates that could be exhumed at least for display.

kevingillespie@usa.net

The SP Sacramento yard area is said to have many very early locomotives used as fill and rip-rap.

I think it was last year that there was two or three "fill" locomotives pulled out in Alaska.

My favorite has to be the Rodgers 2-4-2 "fill locomotive" that was pulled out and restored to operation no less. I think it's in New Zealand.

Smokebox

> There was a post about several steam
> locomotives that were almost buried (UP618,
> CRI&P938, and AT&SF5030). Did this
> actually happen to any steamers. I've heard
> of steam locomotives at the bottom of
> rivers.

> I don't expect to find an NYC J-3 Hudson
> under the turntable at Harmon, but does
> anyone here know of any possible candidates
> that could be exhumed at least for display.

Here are a couple that I know about:

1. Somewhere out west (Kansas?) there was a bridge over a river that due to high winter snow meltoff was in danger of being swept away. The Santa Fe decided to try to "weigh down" the bridge by putting a number of retired, out of service, steam locomotives on it. Unfortunately, the waters took out one of the spans anyway. I believe that two 2-8-2 Mikagos and a 2-6-2 Prairie ended up in the river. L&RP had an article about these engines with a report that low water levels in the river one year exposed parts of two of the locomotives (some parts were "cut away" as a danger to navigation.) There was no trace of the third locomotive.

2. A Chesapeake & Ohio 4-4-0 was involved in attempts to reopen an abandoned tunnel (I believe in Richmond, VA) as a bypass route. Powering a work train, there was a cave in and the American Standard was left buried when the tunnel was resealed off.

midlandblb@cs.com

> I don't expect to find an NYC J-3 Hudson
> under the turntable at Harmon, but does
> anyone here know of any possible candidates
> that could be exhumed at least for display.

There was a news item in "Railfan" ~10 (?) years ago about a buried steamer in eastern Virginia near the North Carolina border. It was supposedly used by contractors in the ~1920's building the highway, and then was abandoned in place for years. The highway department dug a pit a shoved it over into it and covered it over. Somebody checked up on this story, got a metal detector and confirmed that there was indeed a metal mass of the proper mass in the proper place. Never heard any more about it, but they had planned to at least dig it up.


the Ultimate Steam Page
whodom@awod.com

Found a page about the New Zealand engine:

http://www.geocities.com/railwaypreserv ... s/K88.html


New Zealand Buried Steam Locomotive
bilburns1313@ameritech.net

I am not sure, but I think this is one of the two locmotives at Jimmy Baird's place near Bealton, VA.

Steve

> There was a news item in "Railfan"
> ~10 (?) years ago about a buried steamer in
> eastern Virginia near the North Carolina
> border. It was supposedly used by
> contractors in the ~1920's building the
> highway, and then was abandoned in place for
> years. The highway department dug a pit a
> shoved it over into it and covered it over.
> Somebody checked up on this story, got a
> metal detector and confirmed that there was
> indeed a metal mass of the proper mass in
> the proper place. Never heard any more about
> it, but they had planned to at least dig it
> up.


SZuidervee@aol.com

...with photos of all three.

K 88:

http://www.midcan.co.nz/plains.htm

K 92:

http://www.trainweb.org/nzbranches/locos/steam/k92.htm

K 94:

http://homepages.paradise.net.nz/dilly/b/trains3.htm



bilburns1313@ameritech.net

There is supposed to be a CM&StP Ten Wheeler buried in Sanderson Marsh just north of Madison, WI.

As the story goes, it derailed at speed and before they could get the big hook on the scene the engine had sunk out of sight.

Todd Jones

Restoring MILW E9 33C
milw104c@charter.net

> The SP Sacramento yard area is said to have
> many very early locomotives used as fill and
> rip-rap.

> Smokebox

Years ago when the UP started cleaning up the property around the old Sacto Locomotive Works, they dug up a good number of steam locomotive parts, but no whole locomotives that I ever saw. For a time a visitor to the old "Unit Shop" where the CSRM's restoration work was performed, could walk out back amongst sections of boilers (obviously from the days when the preferred fuel was wood), many of which showed the results of explosions. They were quite impressive in their own right.

Brian Wise

http://www.trainweb.org/msrhf
midsouth@mail.com

> I don't expect to find an NYC J-3 Hudson
> under the turntable at Harmon, but does
> anyone here know of any possible candidates
> that could be exhumed at least for display.

Stories keep circulating that there may be several steam locomotives buried at the Hanford nuclear reservation. These stories say that a lot of material was exposed to varying amounts of radiation and simply buried to prevent further contamination. Does anyone have any knowledge about this or is it all rumor???

doug@nprymuseum.org

> The SP Sacramento yard area is said to have
> many very early locomotives used as fill and
> rip-rap.

> I think it was last year that there was two
> or three "fill" locomotives pulled
> out in Alaska.

> My favorite has to be the Rodgers 2-4-2
> "fill locomotive" that was pulled
> out and restored to operation no less. I
> think it's in New Zealand.

> Smokebox

One of the locomotives pulled from the rip rap in Alaska is the Blue Mountain, the oldest locomotive in Washington State. Plans are to eventually restore her.


Blue Mountain History

crisolite@aol.com

> 1. Somewhere out west (Kansas?) there was a
> bridge over a river that due to high winter
> snow meltoff was in danger of being swept
> away. The Santa Fe decided to try to
> "weigh down" the bridge by putting
> a number of retired, out of service, steam
> locomotives on it. Unfortunately, the waters
> took out one of the spans anyway. I believe
> that two 2-8-2 Mikagos and a 2-6-2 Prairie
> ended up in the river. L&RP had an
> article about these engines with a report
> that low water levels in the river one year
> exposed parts of two of the locomotives
> (some parts were "cut away" as a
> danger to navigation.) There was no trace of
> the third locomotive.

Les,

the Arbonnet ran an article about this in their 2nd Quarter 2001 issue. In July 1951, the Kaw River (Kansas River by another name) went way over its banks, and others did at various times from April through July in Missouri and Kansas, due to heavy rainfall. The worst was July 9-13, with 17 inches of rain in some places. Argentine Yard was badly flooded; only the hump managed to sill look over the crest and had been used to store as many locomotives as possible. A Santa Fe bridge over the Kaw, marked 49-B west of Topeka, Kansas, broke on July 13. It had been weighed down with 4 steamers, and the two spans dropping took three of them down just after noon. A Rock Island bridge nearby fell three hours later. The article does not specify what engines were on the bridge, except a photo of October 1955 shows remnants of 2-6-2 no. 1035 in the Kaw River bed after it hasd surfaced in a drought and then cut up by Santa Fe crews.

Another buried engine I am aware of is the Arthur Tandy, a small tank loco (0-4-4T?) of the Montpelier and Wells River which was used as rip-rap in building some road structure in the twenties. I'd have to dig for my book "Vermont's Granite Railroads" on the Montpelier and Wells River and Barre and Chelsea and related railroads to provide more robust information on it. That enigne is definitely lost. It was acquired in the 1880s or 1890s for local passenger service.

Cheers, Jochen

JochenTrost@cs.com

> the Arbonnet ran an article about this in
> their 2nd Quarter 2001 issue. In July 1951,
> the Kaw River (Kansas River by another name)
> went way over its banks, and others did at
> various times from April through July in
> Missouri and Kansas, due to heavy rainfall.

I apologize for the lousy spelling in my post, it's a tad late at night. That "Arbonnet" should be the "Warbonnet" of the Santa Fe Railway Historical and Modelers Society. There are a few more typos which should be obvious, and their correction should be too.

Cheers, Jochen

JochenTrost@cs.com

I have 13 steam locomotives listed as buried in "Surviving World Steam Locomotives". Nine of them are in the United States; some of them have been mentioned already.

There are still several more steam locomotives half-buried in riprap in New Zealand. They are endangered because they are being scrapped for their copper fireboxes. I found a webpage that listed them along with some photographs, then lost the URL. >:|

A thread under another list mentioned that a small steam locomotive is buried under the Wimbeley Soccer Field in the UK. The stadium is currently being remodeled, and the field re-oriented to face 90 degrees around, but I assume no attempt will be made to salvage the locomotive.

Both buried and sunk is a steam locomotive at the bottom of a mine in Missouri. It is now a popular dive site. I was lucky enough to recieve an publish an underwater photograph of it in a past update to "Surviving World Steam Locomotives". The cylinders on it are not right, leading me to believe it was being used as a stationary boiler. I can only assume it was pushed down the mine, since it is now lying on it's side.

The ATSF locomotives in the Kaw River are:

* 2-6-2 #1035
* 2-8-2 #3167
* 2-8-2 #4076

As someone already mentioned, only two have been found. Perhaps the third was swept downriver a ways.

These are but three of 64 sunk locomotives worldwide listed in "Surviving World Steam Locomotives". I also have 24 listed worldwide as abandoned. They are either in remote locations, or like the one of the ledge of an open pit mine in Huelva, Andalousia Province, Spain; cannot be retrieved.

-James Hefner
Hebrews 10:20a

> There was a post about several steam
> locomotives that were almost buried (UP618,
> CRI&P938, and AT&SF5030). Did this
> actually happen to any steamers. I've heard
> of steam locomotives at the bottom of
> rivers.

> I don't expect to find an NYC J-3 Hudson
> under the turntable at Harmon, but does
> anyone here know of any possible candidates
> that could be exhumed at least for display.


Surviving World Steam Locomotives
james1@pernet.net

> A thread under another list mentioned that a
> small steam locomotive is buried under the
> Wimbeley Soccer Field in the UK. The stadium
> is currently being remodeled, and the field
> re-oriented to face 90 degrees around, but I
> assume no attempt will be made to salvage
> the locomotive.

> -James Hefner
> Hebrews 10:20a

I found this page where a spokesman for the sports complex says it's just a steam generator, "But he promised that the engine would be recovered if it hadn't rusted away if workmen uncovered it during the £326 million rebuilding programme":

http://www.thisislocallondon.co.uk/loca ... ws7RM.html



Field of steams
bilburns1313@ameritech.net