This first appeared on Trains.com.
TAMPA, Fla. — With Hurricane Milton churning toward Florida in the Gulf, freight railroads are on high alert.
CSX Transportation is running as normal but is implementing safety protocols ahead of Milton’s anticipated Wednesday landfall to ensure operational continuity.
“At this time, all CSX yards and terminals are maintaining normal operations. Intermodal customers are encouraged to promptly pick up units network-wide that show as ‘notified’ in our ShipCSX portal,” a railroad customer advisory reads.
Norfolk Southern (NS) is operating as normal but is closely monitoring the storm, noting that high winds and heavy rains could impact rail operations in north Florida.
Hurricane Milton is expected to make landfall in the Tampa Bay area Wednesday evening as a Category 3 hurricane with sustained winds greater than 110 mph.
This would put Regional Rail’s Port Manatee Railroad and CSX’s Tampa-Orlando operations through Lakeland, Florida, and Winter Haven, Florida, in the direct path of the hurricane. Short-line railroads Florida Midland at Winter Haven and the Florida Central in Orlando could see heavy rains and localized flooding as Milton pushes east on Thursday.
The storm is expected to remain a Category 1 hurricane as it reaches the Atlantic Coast along the Florida East Coast Railway on Thursday.
Milton arrives less than two weeks after Hurricane Helene, a Category 4, made landfall on Florida’s Gulf Coast and caused record flooding across the Appalachians.
CSX and NS rail lines are still out of service in western North Carolina and will likely remain that way for weeks as unprecedented flooding washed away large sections of roadbed and at least two railroad bridges on CSX’s former Clinchfield Railroad between Erwin, Tennessee, and Spartanburg, South Carolina, and NS’ former Southern Railway S-Line west and east of Asheville, North Carolina.
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