Pacific Northwest Railfanning || SP's Siskiyou Line

As I am always interested in railroad operations involving semaphores the SP Siskiyou line south of Eugene, OR was close enough to check out on a long weekend drive. From my home in Seattle I drove to Albany, OR for the night and the morning of Friday 8-9-91 found me driving south on I-5 in a driving rainstorm to Eugene and the Siskiyou line.

First train seen was the northbound MEEUM (Medford-Eugene Manifest) with the SP 8281 leading at Divide near Cottage Grove, OR at 12:41pm. I followed it up towards Eugene and waited on the southbound of the day which was the EUMEM (Eugene-Medford Manifest) which showed up around 4pm. Leading was SSW 6872 with an SD40R/SD45T-2R assisting. At Walker, OR a 3 unit helper was added behind the road power. After a very cloudy day the sun finally came out making for a great chase south photographing it passing a number of semaphores. I followed it as far as Roseburg where I was going to spend the night. These are the two trains seen today:

1) NB MEEUM  8281/6771/SSW 9398  (Helpers 7323/6769/7378) Caboose 1967
2) SB EUMEM  SSW 6872/7350/6805/7378/6769/7323  Caboose 1966

Next morning was bright and sunny and the northbound MEEUM was preparing to leave Roseburg when I showed up trackside. SP 6859 was leading and the train had 3 SD9's behind the road power with a three unit helper cut in mid-train. At 0830 the train started north for Eugene. At Walker the helpers were cut out and the train continued on to Eugene. I learned there would be no southbound EUMEM today so after stopping by Springfield to see the local power laying over for the weekend I began my journey back to Seattle. This is what was photographed today:

1) NB MEEUM  6859/7414/7353/4399/4417/4411  (Helpers 7323/6769/7378)
             Caboose 4646
2) SP Local  SD9 4424   Caboose SSW 47 at Springfield, OR  1:30pm

While the train count may have been low I was glad to get a glimpse of SP's operations between Eugene and Roseburg since it would be my only chance to do so while under SP ownership.

And now on to the Gallery....

ALL photos are copyright by BrianA and cannot be used without his permission.