Mudslide north of Seattle stops passenger service
SEATTLE (AP) - A mudslide Thursday afternoon just north of Mukilteo has halted passenger train service until at least Saturday afternoon between Seattle and Everett.
BNSF spokesman Gus Melonas says the slide is about four feet deep and 25 feet long and includes tress as well as rocks and mud.
Melonas expects freight service to resume on the rail line later on Thursday.
The slide came one day after passenger service resumed on the rail line after a series of mudslides since Dec. 17, when a mudslide just south of Everett hit a freight train and derailed seven cars.
The section of tracks along Puget Sound between Seattle and Everett has been hit by 72 "blocking events" since Thanksgiving.
BNSF spokesman Gus Melonas says the slide is about four feet deep and 25 feet long and includes tress as well as rocks and mud.
Melonas expects freight service to resume on the rail line later on Thursday.
The slide came one day after passenger service resumed on the rail line after a series of mudslides since Dec. 17, when a mudslide just south of Everett hit a freight train and derailed seven cars.
The section of tracks along Puget Sound between Seattle and Everett has been hit by 72 "blocking events" since Thanksgiving.
This isn't even news any more.
this is pretty pathetic at this point. does BNSF have any answers for the future here?
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this story has been repeating all fall/winter seemingly and not one article has so much as mentioned any plans to actually do something about the conditions on this line.
Time to abandon the route? It is seemingly down more than it's up in the fall and winter. Maybe shut the line down for a longer period of time and deal with the issues causing the slides. That or move the rail line inland.
This is a joke. What is the point of having an Everett-Seattle run if it almost is never in service? Either fix the problem or cut the service and add more buses to the Everett-Seattle express routes......but then I wouldn't expect much more out of Sound Transit.....
 @dg54321 It does sound like something needs to be fixed. The 72 slides aren't just happenstance; something along that cliff is going to give way and therre could be a huge slide that takes out a bunch of things, not just railroad tracks.
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That area is important for Amtrak. The Empire Builder uses those tracks to get to the east and other trains run to Vancouver B.C. And wasn't there some sort of financial agreement between Washington and the B.C. government to deal with the cost of border agents to check passports? With no trains running frequently, it sounds like everyone is losing money.