Final Spike Steam Tour CP 2816 "The Empress" Return To The Mainline

New adventure, mainline steam, 580 miles, and new gear. In today's video we embark on a journey to the Midwest to chase the "Empress" CP 2816 H-1B Hudson with FP9A's 1401 and 4701 pulling CPKC Final Spike Steam tour that started from Canada through to Mexico. Our trip covers from May 4,5,7, and 8th of 2024. We cover the St. Paul, MN. to Davenport IA. via Chicago IL, sections. This also includes the public event in Franklin Park, IL. Over three states, 580 miles, countless memories made, and having one amazing time. In this video, I'm using my "New to me," camcorder the Sony AX700. Now I've had this for a few months before this trip and everything has worked out just fine, but on this outing I had a few malfunctions and thanks to friends that came with me they have given me two clips to use in this video. C Henderson Rail Productions and GT Rail Fan Productions. These could have also been operator error, but I'm not sure on either but in any case, besides that everything else went well and we all had a blast on this week long trip. I definitely need to come back out here again. Along for this trip as usual, are some good friends of mine, ‪@GTRailFanProductions‬, ‪@DroppedSignal‬, and ‪@chendersonrailproductions704‬
St. Paul - Chicago
These first two days toke us across three states, and 400 miles. The first day was the day I experienced the first two malfunctions, first at Hastings, the next in Angelo. The rest of that day went well and did not have any other problems. Running along the scenic portion of the chase was something I tried to capture.
May 4th - St. Paul. MN to Portage WI.
River Sub to Tomah Sub
00:03 Hastings MN
01:47 Weaver MN
02:41 Minnesota City MN
03:20 Dakota MN
04:15 West Salem WI
05:24 Angelo WI
06:22 New Lisbon WI
07:46 Wisconsin Dells WI
May 5th - Portage WI. to Chicago IL.
Watertown Sub to C&M Sub
08:32 Portage WI
10:54 Fall River WI
11:46 Milwaukee WI Miller Brewery
12:48 Milwaukee WI KK Bridge
16:52 Sturtevant WI
17:47 Green Oaks IL
18:51 Bensenville IL
May 6th - Franklin Park IL.
This was the public day event where she sat on display for the public to come and see her up close. I shot 2816 pulling into the event then the turn of 2816 leaving to then come back after they wyed it to have 2816 facing west to continue the journey westward.
25:20 Arrival
29:40 Departure
33:35 Return
May 7th - Chicago IL. - Davenport IA.
This day nearly doomed us from the start. The rain did not help while crossing Illinois even into Iowa but most of the state was not filmed due to heavy traffic caused by two oversize loads holding up traffic. We made most of it and sort of made up from that and managed to get most of what we wanted in Illinois. The rain was hit or miss throughout and sadly in Clinton IA that shot was short with how much rain was on the lens. Oh well. Elgin Sub - Chicago Sub - Davenport Sub
35:10 Elgin IL
36:40 Hampshire IL
38:06 Forreston IL
36:58 Kittredge IL
41:06 Sabula IA
44:06 Clinton IA
46:55 Shaffton IA
48:02 Davenport IA
CP 2816 a Class H-1B 4-6-4, "Hudson" type steam locomotive was built by Montreal Locomotive Works in December of 1930. 2816 ran in revenue service until she was retired in May of 1960. In 1963 2816 was bought by F. Nelson Blount and moved to Steamtown first location in Bellow Falls VT. Then in 1983 she was then moved to Steamtown's current location of Scranton PA. In 1998 she was bought back from Steamtown by Canadian Pacific to help aid another Hudson, No. 2860. They have been looking for replacement parts for the Royal Hudson. Starting shortly after acquiring 2816, its firebox was converted from coal to oil firing, and the tender received dual water intakes with Canadian and American threads. CP gained so much faith in the project that on April 19, 2000, the railway announced that 2816 would be scheduled to return to service for their steam program by September of that year, but the deadline was pushed back, due to further challenges encountered in the restoration process. The project took over two years and cost over $2 million to complete, making it one of the most expensive steam locomotive restoration projects in Canada. In 2001 is when she came back to operating status since 1960 and quickly gained the nickname of "The Empress". From 2002 to 2011 2816 ran several excursions throughout Canada and even the USA, but in 2012 the steam program was discontinued where she lay dormant with an unsure future. Things started to look up when in 2020 she was test fired and moved underpower in the yard in Calgary. In 2021 is when Canadian Pacific and Kansas City Southern got the approval to the merger, they announced to celebrate this event they would bring back 2816 to run from Canada to Mexico under one flag. Throughout 2023 she went under an overhaul and many test runs before leaving Canada. In 2024 on April 25, 2816 departed Calgary Canada for the journey south to Mexico.

[@GTRailFanProductions]

Awesome video Chris! Glad to finally see how your angles turned out from the trip! 2816 clearing the signal bridge was a hawt shot