Hello everyone! On Monday, April 22nd, 2024, I returned to Marion Union Station in Marion, Ohio, for another quality day of railfanning here at the best railfanning location in Central Ohio. This day of railfanning, especially in the morning, was jam-packed with action from both railroads and featured a handful of surprise locomotives. In the span of eight hours, there were 20 trains between the two railroads, which is about the typical the typical count one can expect here in Marion.
I often say the day of railfanning starts out with a bang, but in the case of today's video, this day of railfanning did indeed just that. The first train of the day was a surprise southbound CSX coal train on the Columbus Subdivision, and the second train of the day was an even bigger one; a northbound oil train on the NS Sandusky District with DC-to-AC 4004 as the trailing unit. NS 4004 was not on the radar to pass Marion on this morning and it caught me off-guard as there were no recent reports on its whereabouts until it passed me as the trailing unit on the first Norfolk Southern train of the day. A little while later came one of the rarest sights at Marion Union Station; a three-train meet. About an hour after 4004 came through, CSX sent two southbound trains on the Columbus Subdivision simultaneously; a manifest train (M631, I believe) and another southbound coal train. Just as the coal train began to pass the station, northbound Norfolk Southern manifest 19M passed going north on the Sandusky District with BNSF Fakebonnet 769 as the trailing engine on the manifest train. This was my first time ever seeing two southbound trains at the same time on the CSX line, let alone my first time seeing three trains passing Marion Union Station at the same time. Pretty awesome.
Other morning action on this day of railfanning contained much of the typical morning action from the two railroads. Norfolk Southern featured southbound manifest 171, southbound intermodal train 266 with the typical BNSF power, northbound manifest 119, and southbound intermodal 28N with an astounding three Dash 9s! Only in Marion over the past year have I seen a trio of Dash 9s, and I was ecstatic to see it once more. As for CSX, the featured action included westbound manifest M331 with an SD70MAC DPU, eastbound manifest M364, and eastbound autorack M216. To tie it all together, I got to see NS SD40-2 6155 starting up and getting to work on the Norfolk Southern local job.
As the morning turned to afternoon, I saw another great meet on the Sandusky District with northbound intermodal 277 passing southbound manifest 18M with a pair of rare fallen flag cars; a Family Lines covered hopper and a Rock Island covered hopper. The next (and sadly, final) train on the Columbus Subdivision was the third great catch of the day with a Canadian National Ethanol train with an ex-CitiRail unit trailing. As some of you may remember, CitiRail was a leasing company that featured grey locomotives with blue-and-yellow striping on the nose. All ex-CitiRail locomotives are now owned by Canadian National and see regular duty on CN trains. This was my first time in over five years I had seen a CitiRail unit. After the CN train, there was just one CSX train for the remainder of the afternoon; westbound autorack M205 with a surprisingly short consist and another SD70MAC. Norfolk Southern featured yet another train meet with southbound manifest 179 passing the local train doing work on the connection track. The final two trains of the day were intermodal train 276 and a southbound NS coal train. Intermodal 276 featured a pretty cool DPU combo of a Union Pacific locomotive and a Dash 9.
Overall, like I mentioned in the title, this was a high quality day of railfanning here at Marion Union Station. I hope to see a day like this whenever I return to Marion, though that will be a while from now given I have already visited Marion four times this year already. Though I will certainly be back in Marion later this year, I plan on traveling to other locations that I have not been to in a long time and want to diversify my railfanning locations. Regardless, I hope you enjoy this video and the number of cool catches.
As always, thanks for watching!
-N&W475.