Has anyone ever used a rail service to transport military trucks other than
the military? Is this feasible?
When I was looking to get a 2.5 ton moved to Idaho, I naively thought that
I could drive it down to the local rail yard (about two miles away) and
burly railroad professionals would load it onto a flatcar, tie it down and
I would wave to it as it disappeared to points far away.
Three rail services I spoke to refused to take it. I didn't get a read on
it until I talked to a professional transport firm. They told me it would
take at least two months to get it from here to there, and could take as
much as a year. The services wouldn't take it as there is too much
liability in rail transport of private vehicles. I listened intently to
the guy, not really believing anything he was saying, figuring he was
trying to square away his trucking buddies. About a week later, I spoke to
my old Supply Sergeant and mentioned my problems getting this truck moved,
as well as the line of bull I got from the transport company. He proceeded
to tell me about when he stood down a unit, and had to get two Armored
Combat Earthmover's (ACE) moved from Maryland to Georgia. He expected the
same thing as I did. They loaded the tracks up, as the arrangement was
that they had to secure them to the car, and joked about staying with them
for the next week or so until they arrived. Good thing they didn't. 14
months later (OVER A YEAR) they got a call from a railyard in Virginia,
wanting to know when they were coming to pick up their tracks. The rail
yard had possession of them for 7 months, and didn't have a record of where
they came from. The only information they had was a copy of the log books
with the unit number on them, and somehow they got hold of my Supply
Sergeant. It took them another two months to get the tracks down to
Georgia, most of that time clearing up who had responsibility for moving
them.
Things like this make me wonder....Where do all those trains go? I think
all the jeeps in crates are still riding around on the rails- the rail
master is probably looking for the Willys Overland factory to deliver the
stuff to....
Dave
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