"The First Bite"
One of Gershow Recycling's excavators equipped with a hydraulic shear takes it's "first bite" from Louisville & Indiana Railroad SW1200 #9321, beginning the scrapping process. About 45 minutes later the locomotive was reduced to a pile of scrap metal (minus the frame and trucks). Built by EMD in 1957 as EMD 23763, 9321 served the Delaware, Lackawanna and Western Railroad (#562), the Erie Lackawanna Railway (#457) and Conrail (#9321) before joining the Louisville & Indiana Railroad's roster. The locomotive ran on the L&I for many years before being sent to the New York & Atlantic Railway, a sister railroad to the L&I, to assist with the increase of rail traffic on the island. Unfortunately the engine was not used much because of it's reliability and only ran for a couple of years before being sidelined with several mechanical issues. It was moved to a storage track within Fresh Pond Yard where it sat for 9+ years before being moved to the Heritage Paper track on the Bay Ridge Branch in 2017. On January 28th, 2020, the locomotive was finally scrapped by Gershow Recycling, a longtime customer of the NYA located less than a half a mile away.
