RIP: Montana Rail Link

 

One of the last semaphores on the MRL.

I first visited Montana Rail Link in 1994.  I returned in 2004 and then again in 2014.  In 2024, I revisited Bozeman Pass, but by then, alas, MRL was no more, swallowed like zooplankton by the white sperm whale BNSF.  This is my eulogy to a gone but not forgotten railroad, a beautiful memory that will slowly fade into darkness like the semaphore in the image above.

http://www.montanarail.com

Photographs from 1994

MRL in the summer of 1994.  MRL 652 is an SD19-1

In the summer of 1994, I was 43 years old, already feeling my age, and the Montana Rail Link was six, barely past the age of infancy, yet a fully functional Class II railroad of over 900 miles, operating the old Northern Pacific line across Montana, some of the most breathtaking scenery in North America.

The railroad originated October 31, 1987, when the Burlington Northern leased the Montana trackage to the Washington Companies, a conglomerate owned by Dennis Washington of Missoula, the largest asset of which was and is a family-managed industrial ship manufacturer and marine freight transport service -- Seaspan Marine Corporation -- based in Vancouver, B.C. 

As of October 2025, Forbes pegged Washington's "real time net worth" at 7.9 billion dollars.  When asked about his business success, he stated:

People always ask me for my secret. There isn't one. You've just got to keep a level head and stay away from greed. I just think in my life I relied on my instincts and had good intuition, and things just kind of fell into place.

MRL 262 (SD40-2XR) at the east end of the Austin siding (1994) below Mullan Pass.  Austin was once a placer mining camp called Greenhorn. The Northern Pacific station was called Butler.   In 1901 the name was changed to Austin, after James Austin, a miner. 

 Why did the BN lease the Northern Pacific line through Montana to the Washington Companies?  In part, the BN felt that the bulk of its transcontinental traffic could be handled by the old Great Northern line through Marias Pass, which involved fewer mountain grades.  Also, the BN would still be able to run its own traffic across the MRL, which connected to the BN on both east and west termini.  Finally, and perhaps most importantly, the BN was engaged in protracted and adversarial labor negotiations with the United Transportation Union, and the creation of MRL was believed by some to be BN's attempt to cripple the union.  

Perhaps in retaliation, on MRL’s first day in October 1987, someone sent three unattended locomotives up Bozeman Pass in Run 8. The units raced up the hill without derailing, reaching an estimated 80 mph, then dropped like concrete down an embankment west of the summit tunnel. 

MRL helpers push a loaded westbound BN grainer across Mullan trestle near the summit of Mullan Pass.

  

MRL 204 East (SD40) leads a manifest down the hill at Mullan Pass.

In 1994 I first met veteran train photographer Art Jacobsen, long known to railfans of the Pacific Northwest.  He and I were both photographing trains at Mullan Pass and began an enduring friendship.  Many of the images in this article were taken with Art.

Many trains on MRL were BN and later BNSF run-throughs that began on one end of the property and terminated on the other.  MRL also ran its own freights to service industries along its route.

When MRL was initially created, BN retained control of the main line from Helena Junction to Phosphate -- to keep access to (1) the eponymous Phosphate Mine and (2) the interchange with Montana Western at Garrison. Thus, BN controlled train dispatching over Mullan Pass.

This created a "hole" in the middle of MRL's mainline.  MRL dispatchers would see a train disappear from their computer screens at either Helena or Phosphate Junction, then reappear at the other end.  BN dispatchers would handle the train in the middle.  MRL took control of this "hole" in 1992, terminating an awkward situation that involved several operating snafus, including one serious service disruption.

On February 2, 1989, at about 4:00 am on a frigid morning, westbound MRL train 121, consisting of 49 cars plus three road units and the three units of Helper 2 (positioned on the front of the train) departed Helena for the 2.2 percent climb up Mullan Pass to the Continental Divide.

When the train departed, the temperature was about 20 degrees Fahrenheit, cold but not unbearable.  However, frigid Arctic air was rumbling down the lee of the Rockies like the runaway engines across Bozeman Pass; the temperature was dropping precipitously.

At about mile post 7, the helper engineer notified the road engineer by radio that the lead unit of Helper 2 had lost power.  The lead unit's windows began to fog, its headlight almost went out and its heater shut down.

When the train reached the passing siding at Austin, the temperature stood at minus 20 degrees Fahrenheit.  The east signal indicated approach, while the west signal was red.  The BN dispatcher gave the road engineer permission to hand operate the west switch to line the freight for the main track.

At the National Transportation Safety Board's public hearing, the dispatcher testified that because of the frigid temperature, the signal at West Austin was not operating and that he had no indication of the switch position.  The engineer of Helper 2 notified the dispatcher that he had dead batteries and no cab heat, and also that he was not going to head further up the mountain without a heater.  Because the other two units in the helper set were pointed east, he could not place either at the front of the train.  

The helper engineer decided to bring the road units to the head of the train, which required movements along the siding.  The road engineer objected, stating to the review board:

[It's] my opinion that the engineer on the lead locomotive is in control of the train, but the engineer of the road power is supposed to be in charge . . . [but] I didn't have what it takes to argue with him [the helper engineer].

A four-unit helper set on a BN grain train.  The third unit is an F45 from the Wisconsin Southern, still in its original paint scheme.

MRL 125 East (GP9) leads a short train up the west side of Bozeman Pass.

The helper engineer brought train 121 to a stop just short of the west absolute signal at Austin, then shut the throttle off and applied the locomotive brakes.  The road engineer explained to his conductor that they were going to reposition the road power to the head end of the train.  He noted that the FRED displayed 75 psi for the brake line pressure at the rear of the train.

The helper engineer drained the cooling system on the disabled lead unit while the helper conductor walked to the West Austin switch.  The helper engineer then moved the helper set away from the road power and backed into the siding.  Then the road conductor uncoupled the road locomotives from the train and signaled the road engineer to pull ahead about 15 feet.  The road conductor did not set any hand brakes and stated at the hearing:

It's not a practice . . . you would have had to set probably more than half the brakes. . . . from the rear end . . . and it would have took a lot longer than it would just to go over the top of the hill.

The road locomotive proceeded to the West Austin switch and began backing into the siding to couple to the front of Helper 2.  The helper engineer was on the ground with the other crewmen to make the connections between the road and helper locomotives.  As the road engineer backed onto the helper set, he told the crewmen that he could not see the train behind them.  He thought it was gone. 

The helper engineer asked both conductors if they had dumped the air on the train, which would cause an emergency application of the train brakes.  The road conductor said, "Yes."

The locomotives, with the road engineer at the controls, then began moving eastward down the hill in pursuit of their train, proceeding through the red signal at East Austin without receiving authority from the BN dispatcher.  During the chase down the mountain, the road engineer twice made an emergency brake application to control his speed.  About a halfway down the hill, the road engineer instructed the assistant engineer to "get on the radio and say emergency and tell Helena a train is coming down the hill."

MRL 119 (GP9) leads a manifest.

Helper 1, called at Helena at 3:30 to push train 195 over the mountain, prepared to cross from Main 1 to Main 2 to move east toward the yard office where train 195 was waiting.  The Helper 1 engineer heard the emergency radio communication from train 121 but stated at the hearing that he did not worry about it because "that was quite a ways away."  He released the engine brake to move eastward, and the runaway train hit Helper 1.  

The engineer stated "[I]t hit us pretty hard. . . . I think it was at least 25 miles an hour."  The Helper 1 conductor was on the ground and radioed the dispatcher:  "We've just had a train hit us.  We have some serious damage."

Two tank cars exploded, and debris rained down scrapnel-like on the crash site.  The crew of train 121 was still traveling down the mountain and saw the explosion from about a mile away.  The City of Helena received 154 reports of property damage from residents within a three mile radius of the explosions.  Twelve residents within a quarter mile reported fragments on their property; four stated that fragments had penetrated their houses.

Carroll College reported major damage to all ten of its buildings -- broken windows, roof penetrations, cracked walls and ceilings, water damage.

Amazingly, no one was injured.

A three-unit MRL helper set leads the two units of a BN manifest up the westbound grade at Mullan Pass through a cut that was once a short tunnel.

The NTSB made the following findings:

1.  The helper engineer should not have stopped the train on a mountain grade.  "The Safety Board concludes that the helper engineer was preoccupied with the malfunctioning locomotive cab heater and did not properly consider discussing alternative actions with the road engineer and the adverse effects of the extreme cold on the airbrake system."

2.  The crew did not properly secure the train when they uncoupled the locomotives.  "MRL and BN operating rules, as well as Federal regulations, require that a sufficient number of hand brakes be applied when trains are to be left standing on grades and that the automatic airbrake must not be depended upon to hold the train on the grade."

3.  The crew should not have pursued the runaway train down the mountain.  "Had the runaway train derailed before reaching Helena, the pursuing locomotives could have collided with the derailed equipment, resulting in either serious or fatal injuries."

4.  The crew waited too long to inform the dispatcher of the runaway.  "The delay in reporting the runaway train precluded the opportunity to provide an advance warning to railroad personnel or to the City of Helena."

To me, the most amazing part of the incident was that the runaway did not derail from Austin back to Helena, especially considering that the pursuing locomotives had to apply multiple brake applications.  Also, what did the pursuing locomotives hope to accomplish?  Did they think they could catch the runaway?  And if they had caught up to it, what would they have done?

The NTSB record is silent on those issues.

(The full NTSB report is available at https://www.ntsb.gov/investigations/Pages/DCA89MRZ01.aspx.)

Photographs from 2004

The "Gas Local."

Beginning in 1954, gasoline, diesel and aviation fuel were pumped west from refineries in Billings, Montana, to Spokane and Moses Lake, Washington. The pipeline crossed 21 miles owned by the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes, and in April 1995, they did not renew the right-of-way lease.  That same year, MRL and Conoco-Phillips launched the "Gas Local" to bridge the 21-mile gap -- from Missoula to Thompson Falls.

Union Tank Car built special tanks that didn't load/unload from the top -- the normal configuration -- but rather from the bottom.  Cars that transported gasoline did not carry diesel or aviation fuel, and vice versa.  Per federal regulations, a box car was always placed immediately behind the motive power.

At DeSmet, just west of Missoula, the 4th and 10th Subdivisions split, with the 4th following the Clark Fork River on level track to St. Regis, where the railroad and river turn 180 degrees back to the east -- literally to Paradise.

MRL's 10th Subdivision climbed a 2.2 percent grade north out of DeSmet (Evaro Hill), so the 4th Sub was the preferred route, but the dispatcher would occasionally route the Gas Local -- a light train with sometimes only about 20 cars -- up the hill when traffic was heavy on the 4th.  For years the Polson Local was the only other train on the 10th.  The route to Paradise on the 10th was about 64 miles, while the journey on the 4th Sub, following the Clark Fork, was about 93.

Inquiring minds may wonder why the MRL split west of DeSmet.  The original Northern Pacific line west of Missoula climbed the steep grade of Evaro Hill and became a bottleneck, so in 1909, the railroad constructed a second line that followed the flat valley of the Clark Fork River, which became the preferred route.  The Evaro Hill line remained in service, providing access to the Polson Branch (11th Subdivision) as well as an alternate route when the 4th was congested.  When the Plum Creek Mill at Pablo closed, MRL embargoed the 11th Subdivsion, but the Evaro Hill line remained in service.

Dennis Washington's 70th birthday in 2004 was held in Missoula, Montana, at the historic Northern Pacific Depot and featured Oprah Winfrey and Ed McMahon.  Here is the birthday train deadheading east along the Clark Fork. 

Same train at Superior.

MRL 402 (GP35) accelerates the Polson Local north of Dixon.  The 11th Subdivison was embargoed when the Plum Creek Mill at Pablo closed. 

Same train on the 11th Subdivision.

Polson local on a different day.

MRL Helpers at Austin.

Same helpers on coal loads at Mullan Trestle.

Helper 2 on front end of BNSF manifest.

Re-arranged Helper 2 on coal load.  

A passenger special emerging from the west portal of Mullan Tunnel in 2004.  The smoke pouring from the bore was called "Blossburg Fog," referring to the first station west of the tunnel.

The above image no longer exists because Mullan Tunnel was enlarged and upgraded in 2009-10.  A little history is required to understand the project.

The tunnel was completed in 1883 with just barely enough room on the top and sides for a freight train to pass.  Smoke was a constant problem.  When diesel-electrics became the standard motive power, mid-train units would sometimes stall from lack of oxygen.

Shortly after completion, a portion of the tunnel collapsed, forcing the Northern Pacific to re-open the switch-backs across the top of the mountain originally constructed to allow trains to run to-from Puget Sound until the tunnel was completed.  In 1888, the tunnel's wooden lining caught fire, precipitating another cave-in.  Northern Pacific then lined the tunnel sides with concrete and the curved top with brick, making clearances even tighter.

1949 saw another collapse, blocking the tunnel for 80 feet.  Northern Pacific spread grout over the brick ceiling and reinforced the area of the cave-in with steel.

The ventilation problem became more acute when MRL purchased new SD70ACes, units that frequently stalled inside the cramped bore.  So the railroad decided to increase the tunnel's height by three feet and width by five, a major and massive project that tasked the skill and ingenuity of the contractors involved.

The brick ceiling was replaced by steel arches held in placed by huge bolts -- eight to 20 feet long -- drilled into the rock, with concrete sprayed into the space above the arches.  The original track in the tunnel was placed on solid rock, so a cushion of crushed rock, sand and clay was laid for new track to ride upon. 

Because of the ventilation issues, Northern Pacific installed a coal-fired and steam-powered blower system in 1914, followed by an electric system in 1948. The east portal of Mullan Tunnel was blanketed with foliage and reasonably inaccessible, so I never saw the ventilation system, though I imagine it was similar to the Great Northern's installation at Steven's Pass.

Originally, the blowers came on when a westbound train reached Skyline, the first passing siding east of the tunnel.  (MRL later removed the siding.)  For reasons that I don't understand, BN deactivated the ventilation system in the 1970's but left the equipment in place.  MRL reactivated one of the fans in 1993, operated by a radio code but used only in emergencies.  When the tunnel was enlarged, MRL removed the blowers.  

On July 20, 2009,  while workers were applying concrete to the newly reinforced roof, the tunnel began to cave in again.  The contractor  vainly tried to stop the damage with more concrete -- like trying to stop the tide with a paddle.  Fortunately, no one was injured, but the tunnel was closed; all trains were detoured.  Trains were staged on both sides of the tunnel for a planned reopening on August 9, but heavy rains flooded the construction site.  The staged trains turned back and were rerouted around Mullan Pass.  The tunnel was reopened August 14.

As part of the upgrade, 400 feet of the tunnel were daylighted on the west end.  The west side approach is now through a deep cut surrounded by boulders the size of pick-ups.  Both tunnel mouths are also guarded by closed circuit television cameras.  Anyone hiking near the bores will be spotted by the dispatcher, who will alert local security details to clear the area.  (I speak from personal experience.)

Photographs from 2014

In 2014, I saw Lombard Canyon for the first time and realized also for the first time that, in the days when the Milwaukee Road still ran trains west down Sixteen Mile Creek, westbound Northern Pacific trains ran compass north through Lombard, while westbound Milwaukee Road trains ran compass south.

Lombard Canyon

Westbound local in the northern reach of Lombard Canyon.

 

Eastbound MRL work train coupled to the front of MISLAU.

Same train horseshoeing into the middle of Lombard Canyon.

The town of Lombard was once the terminus of the Montana Railway as it snaked down Sixteen Mile Creek to the Missouri River and interchange with the Northern Pacific.  "Town" is probably too grand a word for what amounted to an engine house, maintenance shop, two depots (one for each railroad), hotel and post office.  In the 21st century, the only thing still standing is the abandoned Milwaukee Road bridge across the river.

The Milwaukee Road absorbed the Montana Railway as part of the grand Pacific Extension that never, frankly, made sense and never generated enough traffic to pay for itself.  But for the brief flicker of an instant in geologic time, Lombard Canyon saw trains on both sides of the river.

Today (October 2025), the canyon is known mostly for (1) the low water dam constructed by the Bureau of Reclamation to provide a source of irrigation for farmers displaced by Canyon Ferry Lake and (2) the pumping station that lifts water up the side of an almost vertical cliff.  (A complete discussion of the irrigation project can be found at https://www.waltersrail.com/2016/02/lombard-canyon-and-three-rivers.html.) 

Eastbound local.

More eastbound.

In 2014, I also saw for the first time MRL's "new" SD70ACes, all 16 of which by then had been in service nine years.  But the engines were "new" to me.

Eastbound MISLAU lead by SD70ACe 4400.

Westbound LAUMIS attacking Mullan Pass with two SD70ACes.  

Rear of same train with four more.

In the fall of 2004, MRL tested five CSX SD70ACes in helper service across Mullan Pass and believed that the pulling power and fuel savings would more than pay for the cost of new units, especially on loaded coal and grain trains, which typically required two sets of four SD40s or SD45s.  Four SD70ACes could replace eight older units over Mullan Pass and five over Bozeman.  So in 2005, MRL took delivery of 16 of the new alternating current units, the first new motive power on the company's roster.

However, the SD70ACes suffered mightily in Mullan Tunnel, where the lack of oxygen and extreme temperatures (upwards of 200 degrees Fahrenheit) caused the units to stall with unacceptable frequency, which led to the rebuilding of the bore discussed above, which more or less obviated any potential monetary savings.  What the right hand giveth . . .

Four SD70ACes help a loaded coal train across Mullan Trestle.

 

Another four on a loaded grainer.

Coming down the hill.

Again.

On my 2014 trip, as I was leaving Helena for the long drive back to my Oklahoma home, westbound  H-KCKSPO, a BNSF run-through, derailed 20 cars at Mile Post 164.4 between Alberton and Superior along the Clark Fork River -- the 4th Subdivision about 30 miles west of Missoula.  BNSF delivered the train at Laurel, and three MRL crews were to operate the train through Montana for delivery back to BNSF at Spokane, Washington.

The Federal Railroad Administration investigated the derailment and filed a report  at https://docs.google.com/viewerng/viewer?url=https://railroads.dot.gov/sites/fra.dot.gov/files/fra_net/16800/HQ-2014-8+Final.pdf. 

The freight, consisting of three locomotives on the head-end, 90 cars, 43 loads, 47 empties, was traveling at 31 mph approaching the derailment site. The train crew did not observe anything unusual when the train abruptly went into emergency.  The train conductor then notified the dispatcher that "there were cars in the dirt." 

After the dust settled, the conductor walked back to inspect the train and noticed a hazardous material car lying on its side. The train crew called the dispatcher a second time and received permission to cut away from the train and move the locomotive consist away from the derailment.  The locomotives and the first five loaded cars had remained on the track; therefore, the crew escaped injury, though I'm sure their nerves were strained. Twenty cars had derailed and several slid down an embankment into the Clark Fork River.

Three of the derailed cars contained hazardous materials, though none leaked.  Six carried Boeing 737 fuselages being transported from their construction site in Wichita, Kansas, to their final assembly point in Renton, Washington.  Three of the fuselages fell into the river.  All were eventually recovered and scrapped.

The government report goes into great detail concerning the cause of the derailment -- line after line of bureaucratic gobbledegook.  You can read it -- if you want.  The follow summary, however, should suffice.

It was 90 degrees Fahrenheit at the time of the accident.  The heat caused a rail to buckle on a curve.  Although the train was traveling within the posted speed limit, the buckled rail made the curve unstable.  One car came off the rail and pulled 19 more down behind it.

When the derailment occurred, I had crossed the state line into Idaho so I have no images.  In any event, I don't think the railroad would have wanted me snooping around the crash site.

End of the Line

Westbound LAUMIS has crested the Mullan Pass summit and is rolling downgrade toward MIssoiula.

Another westbound climbing the Mullan grade.

Eastbound local 840 approaching Lombard Canyon at dawn.

In January 2022, BNSF agreed to pay MRL $2 billion for early lease termination.  The Surface Transportation Board approved the transaction on March 8, 2023, and BNSF took over operations on January 1, 2024. 

If the original lease was a good deal for BN, one wonders why BNSF would later seek early termination.  Perhaps the original lease was not such a good deal.  Perhaps BN and later BNSF could make more running its own trains across Mullan Pass than the lease payments it received from MRL.

Thus, in the very late 20th century (around 1997), about ten years after MRL's creation, BNSF attempted to buy the lease back, but Dennis Washington refused, not willing to sacrifice a healthy yearly income for the money offered by BNSF.

More than a spreadsheet calculation was at work.  As BNSF's traffic grew in the 21st century, the railroad increased capacity throughout the Northwest --  a second bridge over Lake Pend Oreille, double-track from Sandpoint, Idaho, to Spokane, Washington, double-track and extended sidings from Spokane to Pasco, Washington.  BNSF also increased the number of crews available to operate the increased tonnage.  (Double-track was not an option on the old Great Northern High Line because of the close confines of the Kootenai River Canyon.)  

Traffic across  the single-track MRL was limited by available passing sidings and crews, and the railroad did not want to spend the money to make significant changes.  So BNSF was left with capacity expansions that could not be fully realized because of the MRL bottleneck.  Eventually, BNSF bit the bullet and bought out the Washington Companies for a very very hefty sum.  This time, the money  talked.

I can speak from personal experience that traffic on the old MRL has greatly increased since BNSF resumed ownership.  In the fall of 2024 I spent ten days on the line at and around Bozeman Pass, and traffic levels were about double what MRL had seen.

Still, MRL will be missed.  "Will be?"  It already "is."  In a world dominated by economies of scale, where corner grocery stores are as rare as albino sperm whales, an operation like MRL was a breath of fresh air.  But gone now.  Rest in peace, old friend.

To see my other posts, go to waltersrail.com.

To see my photographs on Flickr, go to https://www.flickr.com/photos/jpwalters/.