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IzzyEng4

Metro North tanker car

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I tried searching the forums and came up with nothing. And so I ask, how many water tanker cars does Metro-North store up at Harmon Yards? With the recent brush fire that was in Milfrod CT along their tracks, couple people have asked how many do they have. MN was dispatching one of their fire tankers to Milford the other day. Just curious.

Edited by IzzyEng4

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I believe they have only 1 tanker stotred at Croton Harmon. It holds 10,000 Gal of water and has a small trash pump.

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There is one stored at Brewster as well, and maybe one in the New Haven area as well

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Here is one of the water tanker cars being towed by work engine #106 at the Brewster yard 3-31-2007

post-11-0-32421700-1334159794.jpg

JetPhoto, FF398, sueg and 4 others like this

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There are 3 tank cars total the fire brigade has. All have 10,000 gallons of water and high volume pumps. They are kept in Harmon, Brewster and Stanford. The key with these tank cars is to request them as soon as you think you may need them. Keep in mind the crew has to hitch these up and they have a daily inspection before they go out on the rail so it could take a little while

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It was the tanker based in Stamford that went to the fire in Milford.

When requested it will likely take a while to get out of the house. While it usually stands on a track ready and waiting, at a minimum, the yard master will have to instruct a switching crew to couple up to it and go. If the switching crew is in the middle of a yard move, they will have to finish up with what they are doing. I am not 100% sure if it was the switching crew that took it up there.

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You could wait a long time for a response from MNRR with a tank car. I mean hours. You assume that the railroad even has a crew around to take it to you. You might have to wait for them to return from another job before being available for this type of response. The tank car is most readily available as a preplan option. If you have some event, such as a water main shutdown or something, you might request this in advance.

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Thanks for the information and pictures. As for the response time up to Milford, I'm not sure what it was or if it got cancelled enrout or what.

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The tankers are maintained and respond with the Metro North firefighters stationed at the variouse locations . When disptached the firefighters respond and meet the train crew who hook it up and go . There are 3 trains all identical . Two are in NY and one is in Ct . There are 5 seperate fire stations throughout the railroad 4 are volunteer and the one in Grand Central has 7 paid with appox 20 volunteer . So just like any volunteer fire company you have to assemble and wait the only difference is it takes a while for the trains to be hooked up and cleared .

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