Agua Zarca, Sonora, Mexico


 Ferrocarril del Pacifico train 52 at Agua Zarca, Sonora, Ocotober 24, 1982. Photographer: Craig Garver. Scanned from a 35mm Kodachrome slide owned by Digital Rail Artist.


Train 52, the daily through freight ("Carga Directo") from Nogales to Guadalajara, has stopped for train orders at Agua Zarca, Sonora, 19.4 kilometers south of the international border at Nogales. 

There's really nothing to the town, just the train order station, where the agent lived, and a handful of people living in a few homes nearby.

Train 52's crew has left Nogales yard at 10 a.m. this Sunday morning, and climbed the grueling 2.2% grade to Encina, 5.4 kilometers south, and has descended 8.9 kilometers of 2.2% down to Agua Zarca. Today's power is U30C 402 and probably another U30C or a U36C. The entire trip should have taken 22 minutes according to the timetable. That's probably the head brakeman in the center of the photo, registering. It's all timetable and train order authority on the entire railroad.

There's still plenty of descending grades left, all the way to Santa Ana, another 85 kilometers away. From there it's a gentile decent to Empalme, all around 1%, and a welcome crew change.

This train will meet train 41, the local from Hermosillo, at Magdelena at 11:40, but that's 67 kilometers away, and it will be in the siding waiting for him.

No. 52 will meet it's northbound counterpart at Hermosillo, 275 kilometers south of here, and will spend about 15 minutes switching.

Further south, at the siding of Lujan, 60 kilometers south of Hermosillo, this train will take the siding. El Mexicali, train 3, is the northbound secondary passenger train coming up from Guadalajara. That should arrive 4:38 pm. 

Then it's fast running to Empalme where it will arrive at 6:05 pm, 8 hours and 5 minutes after leaving Nogales.

Here's a link to the large file at our Flickr page: https://www.flickr.com/photos/digitalrailartist/51724355118/in/dateposted/

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