Has anyone ever found any railroad related items?

[Thunder Bay Minnow]

Has anyone ever found any railroad related items? Locomotives, freight cars, railroad tracks, etc.

My other interest involve railroad history and the rumors of “Lost Locomotives” and they DO exist and people DO find them. http://www.brian894x4.com/RRrumormill.html I stumbled across another rumor in my neck of the woods. http://www.mackinacislandnews.com/news/2005/0709/columnist/065.html

So what have any of you stumbled over?

Thanks for any information.

Jeff

 

[eclipse785]

Haven't dove any of these, but I was driving our boat around a local California lake the other day and noticed that there are quite a few submerged railroad tunnels that can be dove in this lake (Lake McClure). I guess when the valley was flooded to create the lake, it hid an extensive network of railway tunnels. The only reason I found out about them is because the lake was about 15-20 feet low and I could see the tops of the tunnels poking out from under the water. Don't know that I'll ever dive them (or if anyone has) but it piqued my interest.

 

[Doug B]

Yeah,
At Molassis Reef, diving at Key Largo. There's a site on the reef called "train wreck". There are some old wheels, some rail.

-Doug

 

[parrotthead228]

I always dive up in traverse bay in michigan and for years there was an old train car frame but between september 05 and june 07 it disappeared. I dont know if someone had taken it or if it had been burried. I looked in my log and we were in the right place so i dont know what happened. Also there is another car bottom and tressels in Half Moon Lake near Grand Rapids. It is not much to see but it is there. It seems every inland lake in michigan usually has some sort of story of a missing ice cart in it which they would load huge blocks of ice onto trains and off to big cities for refridgeration purposes but rarely do u find them! Its fun to look though! also the stories get blown up to "there is a locomotive or caboose in there....my grandfather saw it go down!" I have heard that story maybe 5 or 6 times but i have never found any of the claims to be credible, or if they were the caboose had been pulled out.

 

[Teamcasa]

Does this count? I frequently see train wheels used as mooring anchors.

Dave

 

[BhamFAL]

Well, I used to work at a RR. We 'found' lots of stuff, much of it 'lost' by us not to much earlier in the day. Some of it was lost by our neighboring railroads. It'd roll down the track, smash through the derails, and go into the drink. These things happen. Our resident diver spent numerous hours plugging holes in 5-15 feet of water raising barges and float bridges. Amazing what some wood and a few good gas driven pumps will do. Once afloat damage was repaired with metal. Railcar retrievals were left to 'professionals'. We never lost an engine or car while I was there. FWIW our diver was non-commercial, he was just a 'recreational' diver who worked for the company and would do what had to be done when something sank.

 

[drbill]

Here in the Casino Point dive park there are parts from the old rail carts that were used to offload the luggage from the great white steamers that came to Catalina before 1978. You can see a few wheels and other items there. Not really a railroad of course.

 

[vablackwater]

http://scubaboard.com/showthread.php?t=170876

Delaware Water Gap, PA side.

 

[Kstnbike]

There are confirmed reports (from the railroad) of a cargo train that was derailed and rolled into Donner Lake, California by an avalanche a LONG time ago. So far it hasn't been found and until recently no one really knew or cared about it. I was told by a few of the tech divers up there that they will be searching for it this summer. It is rumored to be in 100-200 ft. of water. The vis in the lake runs anywhere from 15-40 ft. and is very rarely dove in. I'm hoping to get my Tec Deep Certs before the find it and help with the "extraction". From what I heard, the railroad company wrote the wreck off as a total loss so ownership of anything in there will either be by the state park the train is located in or...who knows. No matter what, I think it will be an amazing wreck to dive when it is found. It isn't every day that you find a train in the middle of a lake.

-Kstnbike

 

[LakeScubaDiver]

If you are ever in Arkansas swing by Lake Ouachita outside of Hot Springs. There are underwater railroad tracks located in this lake.

Here is a link for more information on it...

http://www.lakediver.com/map/arkansas/ouachita.html