Locomotive

Services for Charles J. Phillips Sr., a retired locomotive engineer, will be held at 1 p.m. tomorrow at the Barranco and Sons Funeral Home, Ritchie Highway and Robinson Road, Severna Park.Mr. Phillips, who was 77 and had lived in Cape St. Claire since 1951, died Saturday at his home after an apparent heart attack.He retired in 1976 after 35 years with the Pennsylvania Railroad. He was a member of the Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and a former member of the Annapolis and Baltimore lodges of the Moose.

The first of 70 new energy-efficient locomotives destined for Amtrak's East Coast service rolled off Monday morning from a Sacramento, Calif., assembly line. The locomotives, called Amtrak Cities Sprinters and built by Siemens Rail Systems, will replace Amtrak equipment that has been in service for more than two decades and has logged an average of 3.5 million miles. The new engines, costing $466 million, will be used on the Northeast Corridor between Washington and Boston and on the Philadelphia-to-Harrisburg Keystone Corridor.

In the eyes of anyone who loves railroading, Norman L. Warfield Sr., a retired Amtrak locomotive engineer, was a lucky man. During his lifetime, he got to play with real locomotives and diminutive ones. Warfield, who had celebrated his 70th birthday in January, died less than a month later of cancer in Baltimore. The Baltimore native, who was raised in Hampden and graduated from Polytechnic Institute, became an apprentice tool and die maker and worked at his trade in machine shops in Maryland and New Jersey.

The Presidents' Day storm of 2003 that swept into Maryland and dumped 26.8 inches of snow on Baltimore - a record-breaker - caused a partial collapse of the B&O Railroad Museum roof on Feb. 17, wreaking havoc on its collection of historic locomotives and cars. It was this sickening sight that greeted us when my colleague Jacques Kelly and I made our way to the museum a day or two later through snow-rutted streets. There we met our friend, Courtney B. Wilson, the museum's executive director, who with his characteristic ebullience and optimism was trying desperately to put a good face on a dire situation.

Thomas J. Markle, a retired locomotive engineer and longtime Reisterstown resident, died of cancer Thursday at Gilchrist Center for Hospice Care. He was 81. Mr. Markle was born and raised in Hanover, Pa., and had a public school education. During World War II, he served with an Army artillery unit in the Pacific. After the war, Mr. Markle began his railroad career as a fireman with the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad and later was promoted to engineer. He worked in freight service and handled runs between Brunswick, Bay View Yards in Baltimore and Philadelphia.

Francis Joseph Ruppel, a retired Conrail locomotive engineer, died of pneumonia Nov. 15 at Upper Chesapeake Medical Center in Bel Air. He was 87. Mr. Ruppel was born in Baltimore and raised in Highlandtown. He attended Polytechnic Institute. During the 1930s, he was a member of the Maryland Bicycle Club and won its Harry E. Glock Memorial Race from 1932 to 1934. He went to work in 1936 as a fireman for the Pennsylvania Railroad. After being promoted to engineer, he was assigned to freight service.

Charles J. Thomas, a retired locomotive engineer and athlete, died of leukemia Wednesday at University of Maryland Medical Center. The longtime Dundalk resident was 93. Mr. Thomas was born and raised in Highlandtown, the son of a railroader. He attended parochial schools until the eighth grade, when he left to help support his family. "He worked on a huckster wagon selling vegetables and later drove a laundry truck. During Prohibition, he was a bootlegger and drove trucks with false bottoms where the liquor was hidden," said a son, Charles W. Thomas of York, Pa. Mr. Thomas enlisted in the Navy the day after the attack on Pearl Harbor and served in the Pacific as a gunner's mate aboard the destroyer USS Swearer.

Stamp collectors and train buffs gathered outside the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad Station Museum in Ellicott City on Friday to buy dozens of books of 2-day-old stamps at an "outdoor" post office.The temporary postal service, set up on a cobblestone sidewalk under a white awning, was part of a ceremony to celebrate the release of five stamps picturing five different Civil War-era steam locomotives.The stamps were released into national circulation Thursday in Albuquerque, N.M.The Baltimore District of the U.S. Postal Service, which encompasses the Ellicott City post office, sponsored the outdoor ceremony to commemorate locally the stamps' second day of circulation.

Investigators are sorting out what temporarily knocked out Amtrak train service between Washington and New York Monday. Rail officials focused attention yesterday on the engine of a northbound Metroliner that left Baltimore's Penn Station just before 11 a.m. Monday. After the train passed MARC's Martin State Airport Station in eastern Baltimore County, it pulled down wires and dragged them along a 2-mile stretch of track. Rick Remington, an Amtrak spokesman, said an electric locomotive, like the one pulling the Metroliner, usually has one of its two pantographs extended to carry power to the engine from wires above the track.

CSX Transportation Inc. yesterday unveiled its new $2 million locomotive, hailing it as revolutionary equipment that can push and pull far more freight and boost the railroad's productivity in the lucrative freight arena.The Jacksonville, Fla.-based railroad, which employs 1,500 people in Maryland, becomes the first in North America to place the 6,000-horsepower engine, known as the GE AC6000CW, into service. Most other engines currently in use have 4,000 horsepower."It means a new generation of horsepower that allows it to pull 30 percent more freight," Peter Carpenter, president and chief executive officer of CSX, said during ceremonies at the B&O Railroad Museum roundhouse in Baltimore.

Harry C. Eck, a former Baltimore & Ohio Railroad locomotive engineer who rose to become superintendent of locomotive operations and later, as a docent at the B&O Museum, shared his enthusiasm for railroading with visitors, died Saturday of pneumonia at Northwest Hospital. The Catonsville resident was 86. "You can't go wrong saying something good about Harry. He was bright and energetic," said Archie McElvany, a B&O veteran who retired as general manager of operations from successor CSX in 1988.

100 Years Ago Gowns and frowns In the "In Vogue" column of the Times : "Skirts, especially on lingerie dresses are showing more fullness. Double veilings are being used to give lovely iridescent effects. Velour hats are proving strong favorites. The vogue for black and white alliances shows but little abatement. The jumper design has been furiously revived for dressy shirtwaists. Collarettes of black or white tulle are used to wear with afternoon gowns.

Amtrak will pay $466 million this year for 70 new locomotives to enhance the speed and reliability of rail service in the Northeast Corridor and invest $298 million on 130 new rail cars to serve the East Coast and Midwest. The new equipment will be a major upgrade for a system that now operates with locomotives that are 20 to 30 years old and some sleeper cars that are 60 years old, Amtrak President Joe Boardman said in announcing the federally subsidized passenger rail line's plans for 2012.

In the eyes of anyone who loves railroading, Norman L. Warfield Sr., a retired Amtrak locomotive engineer, was a lucky man. During his lifetime, he got to play with real locomotives and diminutive ones. Warfield, who had celebrated his 70th birthday in January, died less than a month later of cancer in Baltimore. The Baltimore native, who was raised in Hampden and graduated from Polytechnic Institute, became an apprentice tool and die maker and worked at his trade in machine shops in Maryland and New Jersey.

Sick Santa Fes, troubled Thomases and hospitalized Hogwarts Expresses make unscheduled stops this time of year in an Overlea basement that amounts to an electric train emergency room. Brian Kirsch, a 54-year-old Verizon cable splicer, spends his Sundays and nights at a workbench, repairing trains that just won't run right. "As a kid I just liked taking things apart and seeing how they worked," he said one day last week as he lifted out the innards of a Baltimore and Ohio Railroad steam engine marked Royal Blue.

Amtrak will acquire 70 new power-saving electric locomotives as part of a plan to rejuvenate its aging fleet on the Northeast Corridor, the manufacturer Siemens AG is expected to announce Friday. The company has been awarded a $468 million contract to provide the new generation of locomotives over a six-year period. The engines are expected to eventually replace all of Amtrak's AEM-7 and HHP-8 locomotives — breakdown-prone models used by both the national passenger railroad and Maryland's MARC commuter service.

More than 10,000 rail passengers were temporarily stranded between New York and Washington yesterday after an electrical fire aboard an Amtrak locomotive in Prince George's County and downed power lines in New Jersey halted scores of trains in their tracks.R. Clifford Black IV, a spokesman for Amtrak, said about 6,000 passengers aboard 25 Amtrak trains were delayed anywhere from several minutes to more than 2 1/2 hours in the rail passenger agency's Northeast Corridor line, which he called "the busiest piece of railroad in the Western Hemisphere."

It took a catastrophic blizzard to bring Baltimore's railroad legends indoors and out of nature's eroding elements. Without the Presidents Day snowstorm of 2003, the President Washington locomotive - a star in railroading the way the Spirit of St. Louis is in aviation - would still be rusting outdoors at the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad Museum. Instead, the first and last-remaining Pacific steam locomotive and other rusting revolutionaries of rail moved indoors at the expanded and restored B&O Museum.

CSX Transportation's newly retrofitted, $1.4 million, low-emissions, fuel-conserving diesel locomotive gleamed as it was put on display for visiting dignitaries at Camden Yards Tuesday. By Wednesday morning, it will be hard at work at the grunt labor of pulling trains apart and pushing them together at the gritty CSX rail yard in Curtis Bay. CSX officials said it might not get another visit to the ballpark for a long time. "It will go to work," said CSX spokesman Bob Sullivan.

Sparrows Point said this morning it has loaded some of its locomotives with equipment that will reduce idling time and emissions as part of a clean diesel program initiated by the port of Baltimore. The Baltimore County steel mill said seven switch locomotives would be outfitted with the equipment that will automatically shut down the engine when it has been idling for a certain amount of time. The engine will automatically restart to keep the engine coolant warm in cold weather and when power is needed from the locomotive.