Even after Union Pacific’s merger of Southern Pacific, for several years, locomotives for the West local out of Denver on the Moffat Tunnel route was a pair of Rio Grande GP30s. They ran west on Tuesdays and Thursdays, and I tried to capture them as much as I could. Only problem is that the local rarely ventured west of Rocky and Rocky Spur and into the mountains. On January 6, 1998, that was going to change. The crew of an eastbound UP freight died on their hours of service at Plainview, and it was decided that the West local would head up to Plain light engines to bring the train down to Rocky where they’d send a van out to pick up the crew. Finally, a chance to get the GP30s in some mountain scenery! In this view, the train, led by venerable Rio Grande GP30 Nos. 3006 and 3003, has just exited Tunnel 1 just east of Plainview, Colorado, and is rolling downgrade in fresh snow and afternoon sun.
