What seems impossible — to move unusually oversized loads across the U.S. in 10 days — was made possible for Customer Victory Energy.
The move also was noteworthy for the way it started and ended: On Watco short lines.
The product? Two steam boilers each weighing 280,000 pounds, measuring 12 feet, 10-inches wide and 19 feet tall, 105 feet bumper to bumper.
The mode of transportation? On 8-axel railcars, with buffer cars in between in order to distribute the weight load.
The boilers were manufactured by Victory Energy in Collinsville, Oklahoma, and needed to reach a chemical plant in West Virginia.
Their end use will be to produce 300,000 pounds of steam per hour.
To get them there, Victory Energy relied on Watco’s South Kansas and Oklahoma Railroad on the front end and the Kanawha River Railroad for the final leg.
“Watco Companies owning both short lines on either end of the delivery actually made it quite simple,” said Jeff VanderMaas, director of transportation at Victory Energy.
“With the SKOL on our end in Collinsville, Customer service there is just outstanding in terms of the amount of support we get. There was on-time delivery, the engine was on time to start the move, then there was a smooth hand-off.”
The rail route was on the SKOL to BNSF, then TRRA, CSXT, and lastly on the KNWA.
VanderMaas, who followed them out to West Virginia by air, praised KNWA General Manager Derek Jackson and Trainmaster Steve Wilson for being proactive at coordinating such a complicated move on their end with extraordinary attention to detail.
Buffer cars had to be removed and held on a storage track, and each car had to be moved separately for what’s known as a “jack and slide” — a live offload on the line, and it happened “seamlessly,” VanderMaas said.
“Steve even came down in a pickup truck to make sure it went perfectly,” he said. “In railroad history, where else do you get Customer service like that? Since a year and a half ago, when I began planning this move, it’s been apparent that it mattered to everyone at Watco as much as it mattered to me.”
“It was an unusual move, that we get that much cooperation.”
VanderMaas described Watco conductors as “the friendliest bunch of guys you’d ever want to meet.”
It wasn’t the first time for Watco to move boilers for Victory Energy on the SKOL; last year, the line made history by moving a boiler that was more than 23 feet tall — the highest that would ever be shipped, said Ron Spencer, Watco’s director of Customer Service and Collections.
“With overpasses and bridges, that’s the tallest that could safely go through,” said Spencer, whose job entails analyzing dimensions of such big loads and determining whether it will work.
Bound for the Port of Catoosa where it would go by barge to South America, the historic undertaking was made easier due to a new spur built through the Victory Energy plant.
“Once we build the boiler, we can bring the rail car into the shop, load it, secure it, and ready it for transport,” VanderMaas said.
Victory Energy also offers water tube packages, waste heat recovery solutions, fire tube and solar powered units. Their company is built on the principles of commitment, honesty and integrity.
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