Tom's Interests

Union pacific X4014 was one of 25 locomotives in the 4000 class, also known as big boys, they weighed 1.2 million pounds (600 tons) and had the wheel arrangement of 4-8-8-4. X4014 was built in 1941, and delivered in December of the same year, by American Locomotive Company (ALCO), it is one of eight Big Boy locomotives left in existence and the only operational Big Boy, with the other seven preserved on static display at museums across the country. The locomotive operated in revenue service until July 21, 1959. It was donated to the Railway and Locomotive Historical Society in late 1961 and thereafter displayed in Fairplex in Pomona, California. No. 4014 had traveled 1,031,205 miles (1,659,564 km) during its twenty years of revenue service. Union Pacific retired No. 4014 on December 7, 1961. All of the Big Boys were retired by 1962, their duties assumed by diesel locomotives and gas turbine-electric locomotives (GTELs). In 2013, Union Pacific re-acquired the locomotive and launched a restoration at their Steam Shop in Cheyenne, Wyoming. On May 1, 2019, No. 4014 ran under its own power for the first time in sixty years, becoming the largest operational steam locomotive in the world. It now operates in excursion service.

Stormy skies beyond the Whetstone Mountains, J-Six Ranch, Cochise County, Arizona.

August 10, 2007 – The Space Shuttle Endeavour performs a “rendezvous pitch maneuver” prior docking with the International Space Station. (NASA).

An aurora dimly intersects with Earth’s airglow by NASA Johnson

A view of the Grand Canyon from the South Rim.

Rain clouds change the lighting and contrasts over the Grand Canyon.

In the sky

Grand Teton - Wyoming

Crater National park Oregon - Author: Shiloh4Ash

Kenai Peninsula Alaska - Author: gl1d3_gl0w