SeattleRailFan's video: Hanging out above the BNSF mainline Seattle 11-19-2013

Today I went up on the Amgen pedestrian bridge over the BNSF mainlines. The Amgen company built this bridge so their employees that use the bus, walk or bicycle could more easily access their building. The bridge is just north of downtown Seattle proper, and just south of BNSF's Balmer Yard. The Louis Dreyfus grain terminal is adjacent to Amgen. It affords a great view and today we're going to get a lot of action! First up was a northbound stack train led by BNSF 7115 (ES44C4). Trailing her was a CSX C40-8W. We don't see Dash-8 C40's here much as BNSF uses the Dash-9 C44 version. A C40 has a 4000hp engine, the C44 has 4400hp. The DPU units on the rear consisted of one BNSF and one CSX loco. This CSX unit was a C40-8, same as the C40-8W only without the wide "safety cab". On one side of the mainline a southbound garbage train was waiting her turn. On the other side, a grain train is parked on the D8 track of the grain terminal. Before the stack train was gone, another inbound loaded grain train arrived and headed into the terminal. I heard dispatch instruct the crew to drop as many cars as would fit on the D6 track, then double the remainder over to D7. The train was led by BNSF 7418 (ES44DC) with a faded Warbonnet behind her. As she pulled onto D6, the utility job from Balmer Yard came out to assist the train crew. The "utility job" is a guy in a truck that can drive to various places around or near the yard to provide train crews with help setting out cars, throwing switches, etc. In the middle of getting some great footage of the crew setting out the cars on D6, I heard the crossing bells south of me sound off. I turned around to see a northbound coal train approaching. She was led by BNSF 9055 (SD70ACe) backed by another shiny SD and a very faded orange pumpkin. I went back to the grainer in time to see her park the rest of her cars on D7. Then the locos pulled away from the cars to head to Balmer Yard for servicing. A nice surprise was that the DPU on the coal train was one of several Citirail engines that BNSF leases. I just got back to the car, thinking I'd got a great bit of video. Then I heard another train approaching, so I got the camera back out. It turned out to be yet another grain train, led by BNSF 4566 (C44-9W). I think this is an empty, headed for Stevens Pass and back to the Midwest somewhere. Whew! What a great day! Stack train: 7115 / CSX 7840 / CSX 7598 / 1033 ES44C4 / C40-8W / C40-8 / C44-9W Grain train 1: 7418 / 622 ES44DC / C44-9W Coal train: 9055 / 9117 / 5382 / CREX 1308 SD70ACe / SD70ACe / C44-9W / ES44AC Grain train 2: 4566 / 7653 / 5299 C44-9W / ES44DC / C44-9W