CSX sent its first freight train since Helene through Mitchell County Thursday.
The track officially opened on Tuesday, Sept. 23. The Thursday train carried coal from Eastern Kentucky. It was 6,200 feet long and weighed 15,500 tons, and was made up of 110 cars.
CSX restricted the train to traveling around 10 or 15 mph until it reached Marion, in order to be prepared for any unforeseen flaws in the rebuilt tracks.
Road foreman Wes Stewart said that the railroad considered not rebuilding the route through the Nolichucky Gorge, but decided to do so in part because not having that particular railroad might have been fatal to a number of coal-mining regions.
“We’re going to make the coal miners of Kentuck and West Virginia very happy,” Stewart said. “This is a main vein right here.”
Miles of CSX track were destroyed when Hurricane Helene (downgraded to a tropical storm after slowing down over land) came through Western North Carolina Sept. 27, 2024. The worst destruction was in the Nolichucky Gorge which stretches from Mitchell County into Tennessee. Norfolk Southern still has some track closures from the storm, but the Nolichucky route is up and running.
Dan Gurley, who formerly worked in the railroad industry, came up from Raleigh to see the inaugural train pass through Spruce Pine — one of several railroad enthusiasts who waited patiently on Lower Street (Locust Avenue) for the slow train to arrive. Gurley grew up in Boonford.
Gurley listened to the original radio broadcast opening up the tracks on the 23rd.
“When I heard … him say ‘let’s run some trains,’ I just melted,” Gurley said. “Growing up in the area of course there’s a deep attachment to the railroad and everything about it.”
A handful of local people gathered to watch the train pass by at the crossing next to the old depot. Bill Slagle, executive director of the Mitchell County Economic Development Commission, noted the significance of the event.
“This is the first official revenue-producing train,” Slagle said.
The railroad rebuilding effort has not been without controversy. There was concern about the environmental impact of some mining in the riverbed that was approved on an emergency basis, and an entirely illegal mine — operated by a fly-by-night company that was not under CSX control — sprang up in Poplar with the goal of selling rock to the railroad.
Gurley was keeping tabs on the recovery effort from day one.
“A year ago, at this time we weren’t sure that it would ever open again—the damage was so extensive,” he said.
Both Stewart and Gurley credit CSX CEO Joe Hinrichs with the track rebuild.
“If the previous leadership had been in place at the railroad, this would not have happened,” Gurley said.