Maine Railfan's video: 4K Chasing SD70M-2 s On The Maine Northern Railway 10 14 2021

On 10/14/2021 I set out for Millinocket by way of Brownville Junction, in hopes of catching MNR 910 since I have yet to catch anything besides the NBSR 6401 leading. I got a few shots of 909 building their train with 908's power prior to meeting 910 at the "bypass" (the connection between the EMR Mattawamkeag Sub and the CP Millinocket Sub). After watching 909 switch for a while I headed towards Millinocket in hopes of catching 909 on the way. But as luck would have it, they were early and I missed them the whole way to Brownville Junction (although I almost beat them to Packard). The 910 crew would meet 909 at the "bypass" and the 909 and 910 crew would swap power. Which to explain in short, 909 would take 910's power, while 910 took 909's power. 910 would then take the 6340, the GMTX slug set, and NBSR 6304 and would retrieve the chip and log loads they brought down from Oakfield, while 909 took the EMR 6403 and NBSR 6401 and grabbed the mixed traffic they got from CP. 909 would then run to Hardy Pond siding on the Mattawamkeag Sub, where they would pick up empty log racks and empty chip gons, before running around the train and heading up the CP Millinocket Sub. While 909 was out at Hardy Pond, 910 would back into Brownville Junction, then do some switching, before tying down before heading to the EMR bunk house. Since they do the power/ train swap different every time I chase, I decided to just wait for them at West Sebois, ME since that was a sure bet. Before going up, I met up with fellow railfan Connor Bray (Dash-7 Studios) and I would then set out for West Sebois. After waiting 3 hours, 909 got paper from the CP dispatcher to head to Mile 109 (end of CP ownership which is just south of the "Huber" crossing north of the Millinocket Yard). CP currently owns from Mile 76 (which is a mile or so north of the north wye switch at Brownville) to Mile 109. Under CMQ, Job 420 ran a few days a week from Brownville Jct to Millinocket and return. At Millinocket they would interchange with MNR, in addition to serving Dead River fuels, and two log transloads which would ship a large amount of saw logs to Jackman every week for Moose River Lumber. There was also car storage at Millinocket due to the large amount of tracks (the yard once served two large paper mills and required several 24/7/365 switchers, in addition to multiple locals to East Millinocket and Millinocket). But under CP traffic levels fell, as did the speed limits. CP scrapped the log cars (which had been owned by CMQ) because they were "too old for interchange" despite being in captive service, and being in better shape than some of the company cars CP has been sending out. And CP removed the crossovers which access the east side of the yard which ended shipments to Dead River, and finally in April/May of 2021, CP discontinued F12 which went to Millinocket a few times a week due to crew shortages, and moved the interchange to Brownville Junction. Since then, MNR 909 and 910 have been the only trains on the Millinocket Sub, which has fallen into disrepair due to a myriad of reasons. But NBM and CP are currently in negotiations to sell the Millinocket Sub north of Mile 76 to MNR, which will hopefully mean higher speeds, the reintroduction of the log transloads and Dead River traffic. In addition to this, LMS Logistics recently sold the warehouse they owned at Northern Maine Jct to Matthew Brothers which produce windows. As a result LMS has been looking for another warehouse with rail access, and are currently working to fix up parts of the former Great Northern Paper mill at East Millinocket. And there is also a wood chip fired power plant which is looking to locate at Millinocket. But anyway, I would catch 909 at West Sebois, Cedar Lake Road, Perkins, and at North Twin. At North Twin, the GNP had a number of track which served a log dumper, which would dump cars of pulp wood into South Twin Lake, and floated down to the mill in Millinocket. This ended around the 60's and 70's when EPA standards cracked down on the operation, and the mill began to take more cars of wood chips. Currently the road bridge is being replaced by T-Buck Construction. This bridge is similar to a second bridge in Milo which is also being replaced by Wyman and Simpson, while a third at Brownville Junction was replaced a few years ago (which the new bridge is where the first shots in this video were taken at). These bridges date back to around the 40's and are very narrow, and have weight restrictions necessitating a replacement. From there, I shot at Millinocket Yard which is where the scales and shop lead used to be. Due to length restrictions, the rest of the narrative will be posted in a pinned comment. Be sure to like and follow us on Facebook! https://www.facebook.com/Maine-Railfan-1557326820980856/ Follow us on Instagram! https://www.instagram.com/mainerailfan/ Copyright Maine Railfan 2021 All Rights Reserved