Winter
Keeping the Northern Transcon open during the winter is a significant challenge, whether from snow in the Midwest and mountains or rain on the west coast. Heavy rains have the potential to cause mudslides along Puget Sound between Seattle and Everett and in the Nisqually, Washington area between Tacoma and Olympia. For example, in early January, 2006 there were four slides between Seattle and Everett. This was followed in late January, 2006 and again in early February, 2006 by mudslides both between Seattle and Everett and around Nisqually. Following the clearing of a slide no passenger train can run for 48 hours to ensure that the slide area has stabilized.
Read more about this topic: Northern Transcon
Famous quotes containing the word winter:
“Country acquaintances are charming only in the country and only in the summer. In the city in winter they lose half of their appeal.”
—Anton Pavlovich Chekhov (1860–1904)
“Climate of Egypt in winter is the reign of spring upon earth, & summer in the air, and tranquility in the heat.”
—Herman Melville (1819–1891)
“The sky seemed so small that winter day,
A dirty light on a lifeless world,
Contracted like a withered stick.”
—Wallace Stevens (1879–1955)