Breaking

Record New Mexico Rainfall, CSX Outage Deliver One-Two Punch to Rail Traffic

North American rail traffic grew just 3% in Week 43 compared to year-ago levels, masking severe operational disruptions that dragged intermodal volumes well below their recent 10% growth trajectory. BNSF's Southern Transcon — the continent's busiest mainline corridor — shut down for approximately 60 hours after eight inches of rain fell over three days in New Mexico, exceeding the region's annual average of 10 inches. The closure created cascading delays at Los Angeles and Long Beach ports, as BNSF could neither move loaded containers eastbound nor reposition empty railcars westbound. A second rainfall wave extended recovery time from an initial 24-30 hours to the full 60-hour shutdown. Meanwhile, CSX faced a nearly 30-hour technology outage triggered by cloud computing infrastructure disruption, paralyzing eastern operations and cutting intermodal interchange traffic entirely. Train counts plummeted 46% during the blackout. BNSF's weekly intermodal volume fell 0.4%, reversing a 14% prior-week gain, while unaffected Union Pacific posted 17% year-over-year intermodal growth.