Copper Basin Railway – 1995

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Back in February 1995 I planned a trip flying into Phoenix, AZ with plans to spend around a week near Flagstaff on the Santa Fe, El Paso, TX on the Southern Pacific and finally a day at Hayden, AZ on the Copper Basin.  Easy to understand the first two but why Hayden you ask?  My goal there was to try and find a GP9, a former Northern Pacific GP9.  The Copper Basin had a GP9 numbered 204 that was ex-BN 1704, built as NP 204.  The 204 was purchased to work the joint NP/UP Camas Prairie lines in Idaho.  Nice CBRY renumbered it back to its original NP number!

Here is some interesting and historic information on the Copper Basin Railway from Wikipedia for background:     

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copper_Basin_Railway

I started this trip on 2-20-95 with decent weather and lots of Santa Fe and SP trains.  After 6 days it was finally time to check out Copper Basin.  After arriving on the property and checking in at the office I found the CBRY 204 right off the bat.  It was sitting dead but out in the open.  This was the first photo of the 204.

01) CBR eng 204 Hayden, AZ 2-26-95

Next I got a better lit photo from the side.

02) CBR 204 Hayden, AZ 2-26-95 ex-BN 1704

This indeed was the photo I was hoping to get.  Still I had rest of the day to spend on the Copper Basin and soon found a northbound dump train at Hayden with HLCX 4404/CBRY 205/CBRY 401  (GP40/GP9/GP39)  The 205 pictured here is ex-BN 1822 built as Great Northern 670 in 1954.

03) CBR 205 Hayden, AZ 2-26-95 ex-GN 670

And GP39 401

04) CBRY 401 Hayden, AZ 2-26-95

North of Hayden I caught a northbound general merchandise train with CBRY units 402/208/202  GP39/GP9/GP18)  Badly back lit I only roster shot the two training GP9′s.

GP9 208 is former BN 1959, built as CB&Q 274.

05) CBRY 208 N. Hayden, AZ 2-26-95 (ex-BN 1959)a

CBRY 208 got a little publicity when Country signer Dwight Yoakam filmed the video “A thousand miles from nowhere” on the Copper Basin and the 208 was motive power for the train with many clips of the GP9.

Trailing unit was GP18 202.built as the Rock Island 1238 in 1963.

06) CBRY 202 N. Hayden, AZ 2-26-95 (ex-RI)

And a back shot of the 202 going away, much better sun angle this way.

07) CBR eng 202 N. Hayden, AZ 2-26-95

Looking for another photo of the northbound I ended up near Kearney, AZ where I got a grab shot of my rental vehicle and a nearby cactus.  This is Arizona after all!

07aa) My rental car Kearney, AZ 2-26-95

Soon I heard the train drifting downgrade slowly and got this photo.

09) CBR 402 Nb Kearney, AZ 2-26-95

And a back lit roster shot of GP39 402..

10) CBR 402 Kearney, AZ 2-26-95

That was pretty much it for the Copper Basin.  Wish I could have spent more time here, especially after learning there was another ex-NP GP9 on the roster, GP9 207 which was ex-BN 1893 built as NP 276.  But unlike 204 which I photographed as the BN 1704 I never even saw BN 1893 so getting the 204 vs the 207 worked for me.  Still getting the 204 so quickly after my arrival could not have worked out better.

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