Starting off at Plainview we chase the MSLAAMS north on the Plainview Sub, we catch them at Tulia, Kaffir, and Ogg before we break off the chase. 7 units 131 cars. Crew was very friendly. So it made this chase even better.

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Right after the AMSBAR cleared, the train that had donated a unit to DENELP storms by running at about track speed.

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About 10 minutes after the DENELP cleared an Amarillo S Yd to Barstow manifest stormed through with good friend Scott Perry at the throttle.

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Watch the entire video, it will really surprise you! This event occurred on 7Jan2008 on the Union Pacific railroad near Harvard IL. You can see the trees being whipped, hear debris hitting the trailing engine from which the video came, and then see debris flying through the air from the F3 tornado that blows some cars over. Then the rest of the train carried along by its' momentum smashes its' way along creating even more of a mess. The tank car seen in the vid, containing shock fluid, leaked for hours before it was contained.

The tornado started at 3:30 pm about 1.2 miles north of Poplar Grove in Boone county and ended at 3:48 pm about 3.2 miles north northeast of Harvard in McHenry county, Illinois.
The first signs of damage were at Quail Trap road where trees were damaged and sections of roofing were removed from a shed. A large barn was destroyed and other buildings were severely damaged. Large trees were snapped or uprooted. The tornado reached its maximum intensity of EF3 at the northeast corner of Centerville road and Beaverton road. A two story farm house and garage were leveled and large trees were stripped of all branches. The tornado was about 100 yards wide through this area.

There was damage to trees, power lines, barns, and sheds. The tornado then crossed the Boone/McHenry county line as a weak EF0 tornado with just minor tree damage at this point. It crossed Hunter road and continued to track northeast across Ryan road as an EF0 and caused mainly minor tree damage. It crossed White Oaks road then it uprooted a hardwood tree and snapped off pine trees at their base along Maxon road. The tornado intensified as it moved toward the town of Lawrence where it produced the worst damage. Significant damage occurred in the town of Lawrence particularly at a house that had more than half of its roof ripped off and garage blown out.

The tornado then moved across the Chicago and Northwestern railroad where it blew 12 railroad freight cars off the track. The train was moving at the time the tornado hit it...so as the main engine stopped...the remaining cars on the track continued along it and slammed into the front part of the train. This caused a few more cars to derail...including one containing hazardous materials that caused the evacuation of the town of Lawrence.

As the tornado moved east of Lawrence it once again started to weaken with some tree damage and shingles off of a few houses on the northeast side of town. It then ran along Oak Grove road for a stretch where it produced EF1 damage with a hardwood tree snapped at its base and knocked over an old...weakly structured barn with estimated winds around 100 mph. It then headed across farm fields and headed for hwy 14 where it damaged a metal barn and sheared a few trees. As it crossed highway 14 it flipped a semi-trailer and injured the driver at a truck stop weigh station.

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INSANE video from inside the powerful Aurora, Nebraska tornado on June 17, 2009. The tornado intensified right on top of the TornadoVideos.net SRV Dominator, and the window was blown out as an intense mini suction vortex passed over the vehicle. A 138.8 mph wind gust was measured by the roof anemometer as the window blow out. Check out Storm Chasers on Discovery Channel this Fall for the video of the glass slamming into our faces.

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Weezer "Troublemaker"

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I missed catching this train at Lubbock Jct. So I headed up to Palo Duro Club Rd. crossing "known to railroaders and railfans as Buffalo Bowl" to catch it. This train came off the Plainview Sub at Lubbock Jct.

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After the rains, I headed back out and this is what i saw

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Action seen on 5/16/09 the last time i railfanned before my surgery.

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Kenny Chesney and George Strait's song "Shiftwork" set to some railroads in action. I'm not normally a huge fan of country music, but this is a great song. Some railroads included are Canadian National, Grand Trunk Western, BNSF, Illinois Central,and Wisconsin & Southern

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What railroaders and millions of other people in this country and world do: Work For a Livin'. Rain or shine, the work has to be done! Some railroad action is set to the tune of "working For a Livin'" by Huey Lewis & the News. If you guys are getting sick of these music videos, let me know. Also, if you have any song ideas that a railroad-themed video would work well with, let me know. Thanks!

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Here is a video I made set to Brooks & Dunn's song "Hard Workin' Man". Several locomotive types and paint schemes are in the video including Canadian National, Grand Trunk Western, Elgin Joliet & Eastern, Wisconsin & Southern, Wisconsin Central and others. Sorry for taking the old video down, I felt that I needed to make a few changes.

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