Newark Mayor and NJ Senate Candidate Cory Booker Unloads Floundering Waywire Startup Ahead of Election

A video-sharing site affiliated with social-media savvy Newark, NJ mayor Cory Booker was sold to cloud video provider Magnify.net just days before a special election in which Booker is running for the US Senate seat left vacant after the death of Democrat Senator Frank Lautenburg.

People familiar with the transaction say that Magnify, which helps websites manage, curate and distribute video, is buying Waywire primarily with equity.

It’s unlikely that the deal placed a high value on Waywire, which had previously raised $1.75 million

Booker announced that he would give the proceeds of his share of the sale to charity once the transaction was completed.

Waywire was started by Booker and former Yahoo [NASDAQ- YHOO] executive Sarah Ross in April of this year. The startup received a substantial cash infusion from Booker's wealthy supporters including Oprah Winfrey and Google [NASDAQ- GOOG] executive Eric Schmidt. Perplexingly, Booker stated a number of times that he "had YouTube in his sights", despite receiving startup money from the video platform's parent company, Google.

That wasn't the only thing about Booker's Waywire that was off- the 15 year old son of CNN President Jeff Zucker was on Waywire's payroll as an adviser before stepping down once new of his involvement was made public.

After somehow scoring a seat on the advisory board of the rising Democratic star’s Waywire video-sharing site, 15-year-old Andrew Zucker abruptly quit yesterday amid questions over his qualifications.

The rich kid’s consulting career as a “millennial adviser” ended just hours after it was revealed that he had been granted stock options in the firm co-founded by Booker, the Newark mayor who polls show is a shoo-in for the US Senate after a special election.
“Despite the fact that his affiliation with Waywire was extremely limited to only an advisory capacity, in order to avoid even the perception of a conflict, Jeff’s son has resigned from the Waywire advisory board, effective immediately,” CNN said in a statement.
News of Andrew’s stock deal lit up social media yesterday, with critics on Twitter branding it a “gross nepotism alert.”
Corporate-governance experts also called his hiring highly unusual, saying they’d never before heard of anyone so young getting such a cushy gig.

Advisory boards are usually stocked with “seasoned folks who have been through the process of making that kind of a start-up work, or enhancing the capacity of a company so it can move to an IPO [initial public offering] or the next level of business,” said Eleanor Bloxham, CEO of The Value Alliance. “So you’re not generally looking in the high-school age range.”

The funding from wealthy donors for a startup with a poorly defined purpose and appointing the teenage sons of network CEOs to lucrative positions has led to accusations that Booker was looking to enrich himself or sell access in anticipation of winning the Senate seat while former employees say that Booker and others in the company were simply looking to keep it afloat until after the election to stave off a potentially embarrassing and politically damaging bankruptcy.

Although Booker's poll numbers have been slipping before this month's special election, the Newark mayor still enjoys a sizeable lead over Republican challenger and former Bogota, NJ mayor Steve Lonegan.

New Jersey Senator Frank Lautenburg Passes Away At Age 89

New Jersey Senator Frank Lautenberg passed away from complications related to viral pneumonia on Monday. The consistently liberal Senator had championed stronger public health and environmental regulations while in office. The five term democrat was the last remaining WWII veteran in the US Senate.

Sen. Lautenberg had made a fortune building Automatic Data Processing, one of the world’s largest payroll-
services companies. A generous Democratic campaign donor, he entered politics after deciding he might as well bankroll his own ambitions.

“I supported Birch Bayh, Ted Kennedy, Gary Hart, John Glenn,” he told the Trenton Times in 1982. “I thought, ‘If I’m willing to support them, why shouldn’t I support myself?’ ”

First elected in 1982, he built a reputation as a scrappy politician who thought government had enabled his own rise to wealth and thus favored expansive federal programs.

As chair of the Senate’s Appropriations transportation subcommittee, the former two-pack-a-day smoker crusaded against the tobacco industry and in 1989 won a smoking ban on almost all domestic airline flights. That was credited with opening the way for restrictions on smoking in public buildings.

Sen. Lautenberg was instrumental in passing laws that raised the legal drinking age to 21, prohibited those convicted of domestic violence from buying guns and required companies to disclose the chemicals they release into the environment, an early “right-to-know” provision that became a model for others.

The son of Polish and Russian immigrants, Lautenburg was born in Paterson, NJ in 1924. After graduating from high school in the township of Nutley in 1941, Lautenburg served in the US Army Signal Corps in the European theater during WWII.

After the war, Lautenburg graduated from Columbia Business School with much of his tuition paid for by the GI Bill. After working as a salesman for Prudential Insurance, Lautenburg got a job as a salesman for payroll management firm Automatic Data Processing and rose through the company's ranks to become CEO by the 1970s.

Luatenburg briefly retired in 2000, only to successfully campaign back in 2002 with the sudden retirement of fellow New Jersey Democrat Robert Toricelli after Toricelli had been accused of accepting bribes and illegal campaign donations.

On Tuesday, New Jersey Governor Chris Christie (R) announced that a special election to fill the Senate Seat is set to take place in October. The governor also said he would likely appoint a placeholder who would serve as Senator until the election was held, although Christie didn't name any specific individual.

FBI Raids Florida Office of Democrat Donor Linked to Sen Menendez

Federal agents raided the West Palm Beach, FL office of an eye doctor and Democrat donor Wednesday morning who has been known to travel with New Jersey Sen. Bob Menendez to the Dominican Republic for parties with prostitutes.



In addition to the fact that the arrest of one of Sen Menendez's unpaid interns was a country sex offender who was in the country illegally was delayed until after the 2012 elections, the New Jersey Democrat also allegedly didn't pay some of the prostitutes hired to entertain him and Dr. Solomon Melgen at Melgen's Dominican villa.

Now, allegations that Sen. Menendez and Dr Melgen used the services of underage prostitutes that federal agents have deemed credible have surfaced, reportedly prompting Wednesday's raid.

Stringing up crime scene tape and using a locksmith, the FBI on Tuesday and Wednesday raided the West Palm Beach business of an eye doctor suspected of providing free trips and even underage Dominican Republic prostitutes to U.S. Sen. Bob Menendez — who has denied what he calls the “fallacious allegations.”

Agents hauled away boxes and bags of evidence from the medical-office complex of Dr. Salomon Melgen, a contributor to Menendez and other prominent politicians, to start hauling away potential evidence in several vans.

On Wednesday, the FBI agents were joined by an inspector from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, indicating the search-and-seizure raid has ties to a possible Medicare fraud inquiry. Melgen has also been the subject of a parallel federal investigation into his relationship with Menendez, D-N.J., who was first accused of improprieties in the conservative Daily Caller website.

Melgen also owns a private CL-600 Challenger plane through one of his West Palm Beach-based companies, records show, and frequently flies between South Florida and Casa de Campo in the Dominican Republic, where he is from.

Menendez has flown on the plane at least once, when he was chairman of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee from 2009 to 2011, when the Melgens contributed about $60,400 to the group.

Melgen was first linked to Menendez just before the November elections, when the Daily Caller website interviewed two alleged prostitutes who said they had relations with the New Jersey Democrat at Melgen’s Dominican Republic mansion in Casa de Campo.

After the election, the news died down.

But then, days before Menendez was about to start leading the Senate Foreign Relations Committee as chairman, reporters started receiving a 58-page dossier of emails between a Miami FBI agent and a tipster who claimed that some of the prostitutes had been underage.

Despite news of the prostitution scandal just days before the election, Sen. Menendez was re-elected by a substantial margin. For his part, Menendez denies any wrongdoing and fellow Democrats questioned the credibility of the Daily Caller.

The age of consent in the Dominican Republic, like most states in the USA, is eighteen.

One aspect of the story that's been overlooked in light of the underage prostitute allegations is that despite having an outstanding IRS lein of more than $11 million, Dr Melgen was able to donate more than $60,000 to the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee between 2009 and 2011 when menendez was chair and still has the private jet and Dominican villa.

Blue State Graft Watch- Feds Ordered to Delay Arrest of New Jersey Senator's Staffer Until After Election

Recently released documents obtained by the Associated Press show that federal agents investigating an unpaid intern working for Sen Robert Menendez (D-NJ) for being in the country illegally and aggravated sexual assault were under pressure to postpone any arrest until after the November 2012 elections.

[A]ccording to the internal agency documents, the agents were ordered by Washington to hold off after officials warned of "significant interest" from Congress and news organizations since the suspect was a volunteer intern for New Jersey Sen. Robert Menendez.

Luis Abrahan Sánchez Zavaleta was an immigrant from Peru who had overstayed a visitor visa that allowed him to enter the United States. He eventually was arrested at his home in New Jersey on Dec. 6. He has since been released from an immigration jail and is facing deportation.

When The Associated Press first disclosed the delayed arrest of last month, Sanchez, 18, the Homeland Security Department said AP's report was "categorically false."

According to those documents, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents in Newark had arranged to arrest Sanchez at the local prosecutor's office on Oct. 25. That was fewer than two weeks before the election.

Noting that Sanchez was a volunteer in Menendez's Senate office, ICE officials in New Jersey advised that the arrest "had the possibility of garnering significant congressional and media interest" and were "advised to postpone the arrest" until officials in Washington gave approval. The documents describe a conference call between officials Washington and New Jersey to "determine a way forward, given the potential sensitivities surrounding the case."

In a letter Monday, Assistant DHS Secretary Nelson Peacock said an allegation that the government delayed Sanchez's arrest "for political purposes" was categorically false. Neither the unnamed U.S. official cited in AP's original story or the senators in their letters to the department had specifically alleged that the arrest had been delayed for political purposes. The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because this person was not authorized to discuss details of Sanchez's immigration case, told AP last month that the department had instructed federal agents not to arrest Sanchez until after Election Day.

The documents provided to Congress do not indicate why the arrest should have been delayed or whether anyone outside Immigration and Customs Enforcement — such as in the headquarters offices of the Homeland Security Department — was consulted.


According to police records, Sanchez was 15 when he was arrested on a charge of aggravated sexual assault in 2009. The records show he was accused of sexually assaulting an 8-year-old boy at least eight times and sentenced to two years' probation and required to register as a sex offender. The AP is not reporting the boy's relationship to Sanchez to avoid identifying the victim.

The agency documents show that Sanchez failed to update his sex offender registration, and local prosecutors considered arresting him for that. During the same time, immigration officials learned that Sanchez had applied for the Obama administration's Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, which would have allowed him to stay in the country and legally work for two years. He did not disclose his arrest or status as a sex offender on the application and was eventually denied, according to the documents.

Prior to the 2012 election, Sen Menendez was enmeshed in a sex scandal when two women from the Dominican Republic said that the Senator paid to have sex with them, reportedly short-changing one of the women.

A high-ranking Dominican official confirmed that both Sen Menendez and a donor identified as Dr Salomon Melgen were frequent visitors to the island nation and attended parties at Megen's villa where orgies were said to hake place.

Quickie Iron Horse Roundup- Conrail Freight Derails, Spills Chemicals in New Jersey; Canadian National Begins Testing LNG-Fueled Locomotives

AP Photo

CONRAIL- Officials from the NTSB are investigating the Friday morning derailment of a Conrail Shared Assets freight train in Paulsboro, NJ that sent several tank cars tumbling into Mantua Creek [a video of the bridge in action before the derailment can be viewed here- NANESB!].

The Conrail freight was pulling 84 cars and heading southbound along a branchline when the derailment occurred Friday morning. At least one of the cars ruptured, sending a cloud of vinyl chloride into the air and forcing the evacuation of hundreds of residents nearby- 70 people were also hospitalized with respiratory problems.

Conrail and investigators from the National Transportation Safety Board are focusing on the 139 year old bridge- a movable 'A Frame' type span. The bridge was manually operated and had a bridge tender on site until the last decade or so. There was reportedly a minor derailment along the same bridge in 2009 and Conrail was investigating problems with trackside signals near the bridge in the week or so before Friday's derailment.

The swing bridge opens and shuts to accommodate boat traffic along the river and crews were reporting that the signals leading up to the bridge would remain yellow instead of turning green.

The veteran two-person crew operating the CSX train Friday was familiar with the route and had run it the three previous nights. They had started their shift at 3 a.m. in Camden and were surprised to get a yellow signal when they approached the bridge at about 7 a.m. They used a keypad device, similar to a garage door opener, to try to get a green light, to no avail. The pair then stopped the train for several minutes, examined the tracks, and got permission from a dispatcher to proceed, Hersman said.

The two locomotives and five tanker cars made it across before the crew looked back to see the bridge “collapse” and a pileup of cars in the creek. The one that ruptured had been struck by another tanker, she said.

Recordings of various data so far support the crew’s account, investigators said. However, authorities are not yet sure whether the bridge deck actually collapsed or shifted.

Officials are also considering tidal surges from the passing of Super storm Sandy may have factored into the derailment, undermining the 1873-built bridge. However, NTSB investigators can't do a thorough on site examination until the remaining chemicals are cleaned up.

Bracketing a Liquified Natural Gas tank car, rebuilt SD40-2s #5262 and #5258 are seen in handout photo from Canadian National Railways. CN is experimenting with rebuilding locomotives to run on LNG

CANADIAN NATIONAL- Canadian National Railways [NYSE- CNI; TSX- CNR] has begun testing a pair or LNG-powered locomotives to determine the feasibility of using natural gas instead of diesel fuel.

The conversion kits was supplied by Energy Conversions, Inc of Tacoma, WA and Calgary-based natural gas producer Encana [NYSE- ECA; TSX- ECA] will be providing the fuelling and the maintenance. Officials with Canadian National and Energy Conversions say that the move could cut carbon dioxide emissions by 30%. While Alberta is a leading energy producer thanks to crude oil and the oil sands, the province also sits on top of considerable natural gas deposits. However, the current glut has driven natural gas prices down- although this would put CN at an advantage should the prices persist as it expands the LNG-powered locomotive program.

Canadian National's LNG project is similar to an earlier natural-gas powered locomotive project from Energy Conversions. Between 1991 and 1996, the Burlington Northern Railroad ran coal trains between Wyoming's Powder River Basin and the midwest with a duo of SD40-2s bracketing an LNG tanker/tender modified by Energy conversions. Although the Burlington Northern program stopped around the same time as the merger with Santa Fe to form BNSF, Energy Conversions would do similar work for the Napa Valley Wine Train, the state railways of Thailand and Brazil's Companhia Vale do Rio Doce's [NYSE- VALE, BOVESPA- VALE3 & VALE5] rail operations.

The locomotives used for CN's LNG pilot program are a pair of 1975-built SD40-2Ws that are now sporting flared radiators- like the SD40-2s Burlington Northern used 20 years ago. Both locomotives and the LNG tanker/tender will be assigned to the 480km Canadian National line between Edmonton and the Athabasca oil sands hub of Ft McMurray, AB. Built in the 1920s, the line was originally part of the Northen Alberta Railway until NAR was taken over by CN in 1981. By 1994, CN ceased operations and the line was acquired by Rail Link's Lakeland & Waterways- who were brought into the Rail America fold by 1999. In the summer of 2000, Rail America halted operations on the Ft. McMurray line and within a few months, Canadian shortline operator CANDO contracting acquired the line outright from CN, only to have CN repurchase the line at the end of 2007.

Presently, the Canadian National hauls construction materiel, pipe and heavy machinery up to Ft McMurray and brings oil sands extraction byproducts like petroleum coke and sulphur south.

Wisconsin Southern E9A #101 seen hauling the Toys for Tots train cross the Rock River east of Edgerton, WI on November 3rd, 2012. photo- Brian Allen

WISCONSIN- Just a quick update out of the Badger State. I had earlier reported that Soo Line 2-8-2 Mikado #1003 was scheduled to haul a Toys for Tots holiday train over the Wisconsin & Southern last month.

However, shortly before the scheduled November 3rd departure, the #1003 was sidelined with an unspecified mechanical problem. Wisconsin & Southern E9A #101 handled the Toys for Tots train between Milton and Middletown, WI.

The #1003 was pulled from service two years ago in order to under to undergo her FRA-mandated 15 year boiler inspection. Due to rising costs, there were some concerns from the preservation community that the #1003 would never return to service again.

OHIO- Two Ohio-based preservation groups have announced plans to begin restoration of a 100 year old ALCo steam engine to service.

Colombus-based American Steam Railroad Preservation Association has reached an agreement with the Cleveland-based Midwest Railway Preservation Society to house the restoration of former St Louis-San Francisco 2-8-2 Mikado #1352 at the MRPS' former Baltimore & Ohio roundhouse in Cleveland.

The #1352 was built by ALCo in 1912 and operated on the Frisco for nearly 45 years before her 1956 retirement. The Frisco donated the #1352 to Kansas City where she was on display at Swoop Park, but soon fell victim to neglect and vandalism. A group of concerned preservationists eventually purchased the 1352 and moved her into storage in rural Illinois.

The MRPS is also home to another, slightly newer ALCo 2-8-2 Mikado- former Grand Trunk Western #4070. The #4070 was built in 1918 and most recently operated in 1990 on the nearby Cuyahoga Valley Scenic Railroad.

Iron Horse Roundup for October/November 2012

EGYPT- At least 49 schoolchildren in southern Egypt were killed when the bus transporting them to school was struck by a speeding train at the village of al-Mandara on Saturday.

The bus was carrying more than 50 children ages four to six when it was hit near al-Mandara village in Manfaloot district in the province of Assiut, a security official said. He said it appeared that the railroad crossing was not closed as the train sped toward it.

Books, school bags and children's socks were strewn along the tracks near the blood-stained, mangled bus. Parents of the missing wailed as they looked for signs of their children. An Associated Press reporter at the scene said many of the remains were unrecognizable.

All officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to the media.

Residents in Assiut complained that there were not enough ambulances in the area that could respond quickly enough and that the ambulances themselves were ill-equipped to deal with the emergency.

At al-Mandara village, angry families and locals gathered near the tracks, shouting at officials. Some chanted: "Down with Morsi!"

This is the biggest disaster in Egypt since the Muslim Brotherhood-backed Mohammed Morsi took power in the wake of last year's 'Arab Spring' popular uprising. With frequent accidents and outdated equipment, Egypt's rail network has long been considered unsafe and accident-prone.

A pair of New Jersey Transit GP40s seen delivering 21 new Bombardier multilevel commuter cars at Dunellen, NJ on November 17, 2012. The cars are sorely needed after Superstorm Sandy damaged or detroyed 25% of NJ Transit's passenger cars after they were sent to a low-lying rail yard before Superstorm Sandy made landfall in late October. Robert Pisani photo

NEW JERSEY TRANSIT- New Jersey's commuter railroad agency has been dealt a considerable setback in their attempt to resume full service in the wake of Sandy after officials had decided to shuttle locomotives and rolling stock to a low-lying yard in Harrison, NJ ahead of the superstorm.

At least $385 million in equipment- including nine dual-mode locomotives, 84 multi-level commuter cars and NJT's computer equipment for dispatching- were damaged in a tidal surge at the Meadowlands facility while more equipment was damaged at the agency's Hoboken terminal and rail yard.

"If there's a predicted 13-foot or 10-foot storm surge, you don't leave your equipment in a low-lying area," said David Schanoes, a railroad consultant and former deputy chief of field operations for Metro North Railroad, a sister railway serving New York State. "It's just basic railroading. You don't leave your equipment where it can be damaged."

Most of the avoidable damage came at NJ Transit's Meadows Maintenance Complex, a sprawling 78-acre network of tracks and buildings in an industrial area of Kearny that is surrounded by wetlands. The complex is the primary maintenance center for the agency's locomotives and rail cars, with both outdoor and indoor equipment storage; repair, servicing, cleaning, inspection and training facilities; and the agency's rail operations center, which houses computers involved in the movement of trains and communication with passengers.

The yard sits in the swampy crook where the Passaic and Hackensack rivers come together. Elevation maps show that it lies between 0 and 19 feet above sea level. The National Hurricane Center was predicting a storm surge of 6 to 11 feet along the New Jersey and New York coast on top of an unusual tide that already had the rivers running high.

Forecasts were that the storm would make landfall on Monday, October 29, somewhere along the New Jersey or New York coast. On Friday, October 26, executives from the New York City subway system and all of the region's commuter rail systems - NJ Transit, Long Island Rail Road and Metro North Railroad - decided they would halt all service Sunday night.

NJ Transit's last trains left their originating stations at 11 p.m. on Sunday, and workers spent the next 12 hours securing equipment, said Weinstein.

At NJ Transit's emergency command center, reports streamed in from the governor's command center in Trenton, county emergency management officials and the National Weather Service, which provided frequent updates on the storm's progress. Monitoring those reports and advising the agency on what to expect from the storm was NJ Transit Police Capt. Robert Noble, who is well-versed and trained in monitoring storms, Weinstein said.

On any given weekday, New Jersey Transit carries an estimated 136,000 people between New Jersey and New York's Penn Station. NJT got some relief in the form of 21 new bilevel Bombardier commuter cars assembled in Plattsburgh, NY that arrived on Nov 17th.

Shortline operator Morristown and Erie has reportedly been contracted by the agency to repair at least ten of the damaged NJT locomotives at their Morristown, NJ shops.

Mass Coastal GP9M #2008 seen trundling down the Falmouth line past the cove at Bourne, MA with a trash train enroute to the Otis transfer station in August 2008. Ryan Parent photo

MASS COASTAL- Chicago-based Iowa Pacific Holdings acquired a controlling interest in the parent company of two southeastern Massachusetts shortlines in late October.

Iowa Pacific announced the acquisiton of Cape Rail, Inc- the parent company of Mass Coastal and Cape Cod Central- last month. Cape Cod Central hauls seasonal excursion trains on Cape Cod while Mass Coastal handles freight on the former New Haven Falmouth Line in addition to a pair of lines that serve New Bedford, MA and Fall River, MA from a CSX interchange in Taunton, MA. Both the Fall River and New Bedford lines are reportedly prime candidates for a proposed expansion of MBTA commuter rail service to Boston's South station. Mass Coastal has operated those lines for the last two years.

Other railroads in the Iowa Pacific fold include the Permian Basin Railways in New Mexico, San Luis & Rio Grande in Colorado, the Mount Hood Railroad in Oregon and the Saratoga & North Creek in upstate New York.

Norfolk Southern SD60 #6920 seen at Brea, OH with intermodal train 21G.
Dan Davidson photo.

NORFOLK SOUTHERN- Norfolk Southern unveiled a specially painted locomotive honoring veterans just prior to Veteran's Day.

Photographers got a glimpse of red white and blue (not to mention copious amounts of black) SD60M #6920 at the railroad's Altoona, PA facility before it headed south for a Veteran's Day event in Norfolk, VA. According to a press release, the special paint scheme required 26 employees (two of whom were veterans) and 66 gallons of paint. The railroad also stated that military veterans currently make up about 14% of their current workforce and they were ranked #32 by GI Jobs in their list of top 100 military and veteran-friendly employers.

After the Veteran's Day weekend ceremonies, the #6920 resumed regular service and was spotted leading intermodal freight 21G through Ohio.

Hundreds of Thousands Without Power As Death Toll From Hurricane Sandy Expected to Rise

Storm surge from Hurricane Sandy inundating the Inlet section of Atlantic City, NY as seen from above Dan Cuellar photo

From Labrador to South Carolina, much of the eastern seaboard is digging out from the havoc wrought by Hurricane Sandy's impact and local officials are starting to assess the damage as the death toll from the storm is expected to climb.

Hurricane Sandy- dubbed Frankenstorm after some meteorological projections put it on a collision course with another winter storm system moving in from the Midwest- made landfall just south of Atlantic City, NJ on October 30 before moving inland into Pennsylvania. Although it lost strength after moving inland, all five boroughs of New York City were hit particularly hard by the outer bands of Sandy.

Sandy's impact on the Big Apple was a double whammy of storm surges coming around the same time as high tide. From lower Manhattan to Queens, streets, tunnels and subway lines were flooded, stranding residents and forcing the NYPD and FDNY to respond to a number of calls by boat. In the Breezy Point section of Queens, as many as 110 homes were lost during a 5-alarm fire since the FDNY's trucks could not navigate the flooded streets to reach the homes until the tide receded.

State Island was the hardest hit out of all the boroughs in New York City. Portions of the island were under an evacuation order, but a number of residents chose to ride it out after Staten Island was left relatively unscathed by Sandy last year. According to officials 15 of the 39 confirmed fatalities in New York City from Sandy were on Staten Island.

Even amid the storm, several New York City hospitals took the unprecedented step of evacuating hundreds of patients as backup generators failed. Bellvue Hospital, which had received patients from elsewhere during the storm, began evacuating about 400 patients to Mt. Sinai. A New York City Health and Hospital Corporation official said that National Guardsmen activated due to Sandy instrumental in bringing in much needed fuel for the generator and assisting staff with transporting patients into waiting ambulances. Some of the patients had to be moved down 17 flights of stairs.

With some subway lines still inundated with saltwater, New York's MTA announced that it will resume limited subway service in Manhattan beginning Friday.

While power had been restored to some 4 million households throughout the region, at least 2.5 million are still without electricity in the New York metropolitan area. Across the Hudson in New Jersey, people have been lining up by the hundreds at gas stations to fill their cars or keep their generators running. Many gas stations are without power and remain closed while the ones that are open sell out quickly and it could be days before they're resupplied. This means that many in the slow-moving gas lines- some nearly two miles in length- will have waited in vain.

Amtrak announced that limited intercity service to Boston, Philadelphia, Baltimore and Washington DC will resume out of New York's Penn station beginning Friday.

Downtown Elkins, WV under a blanket of snow from the western portion of Hurricane Sandy. Higher elevations in the Appalachians received anywhere from 2 to 3 feet of snowfall. AP Photo/Vicki Smith

To the west, Sandy dumped several feet of snow in West Virginia and central Pennsylvania. At least 6 people were confirmed killed in West Virginia and an estimated 109,000 customers throughout the state were still without power on Thursday, prompting Gov. Tomblin to seek a federal disaster declaration. At least 36 state highways remained shut down on Thursday due to rising floodwaters, fallen tree limbs and heavy snowfall. The melting snow is also expected to saturate the Potomac watershed in the coming weeks.

Today's Train of Thought- Pumpkin Patchwork, October 31, 2012

Today's train of thought takes us to New Jersey in far better times in the not-too-distant past. While one might associate the northeastern corner of the Garden State with a seemingly unending string of refineries, chemical plants and marshland there apparently are still some open spaces ideal for agriculture.

Take seasonal crops like squash and pumpkins, for instance. Despite the recent disaster that has affected the region, this was a pretty good year for the pumpkin harvest in New Jersey. Growing conditions are usually favorable enough that pumpkins can be grown in every county in New Jersey, from Montague to Cape May. Some of these are grown on family operated farms that offer hayrides or for a fee let you venture out into the field to pick your own pumpkins.

Here, Conrail Shared Assets train WPSA-31 is seen trundling past a pumpkin patch in the bourough of Freehold, NJ. Still in Conrail blue, Norfolk Southern GP38-2 #5286 heads past the field towing some mixed freight the day prior to Haloween in 2008. According to photographer and railpictures.net contributor Andrew Blaszczyk, all the good pumpkins in the field in the foreground had already been picked, leaving just misshapen ones and 'runts'.

Happy Halloween From Not Another New England Sports Blog

Well, for the second year in a row it looks as though much of the Northeast is going to have a Halloween with widespread power outages in the wake of a major storm moving through the area.

In fact, New Jersey Governor Chris Christie has ordered that halloween celebrations postponed until Monday due to unsafe conditions throughout the state after the Garden State was particularly hard hit by Hurricane Sandy.

For those of you wondering, the enchanting little bruja [and voyeuristic pumpkin- NANESB!] above comes to us courtesey of pin-up artist Freeman Elliot. According to the Pin Up Files, this work from Elliot dates back to 1950 and is titled This Trick's a Treat.

Whatever your Halloween plans are, stay safe tonight- particularly if you have no electricity right now.

East Coast Battening The Hatches for 'FrankenStorm'

Flooding in downtown Norfolk, VA ahead of Hurricane Sandy's arrival on Sunday night. Martin Cornick photo via twitter.

A 'perfect' storm which weather forecasters say is actually a Categroy 1 Hurricane colliding with two smaller storms is set to hit the East Coast beginning late Sunday. While Hurricane Sandy has weakened somewhat after earlier sideswiping Jamaica, the Dominican Republic and Cuba last week,

Hurrican Sandy reportedly had winds in excess of 110 MPH and a well-defined eyewall more than 20 miles in diameter by the time it had made landfall on the eastern end of Cuba on October 25th. Although it weakened from a Category 2 to a category 1 Hurricane

Projected path of Hurricane Sandy, dubbed 'FrankenStorm' after it was forecast that it would merge with two other storm systems

Governors from the Carolinas to Maine have declared a state of emergency in their respective states in anticipation of Sandy/FrankenStorm's arrival. Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey cautioned Garden State residents to take the forecaster's warnings seriously and that their state will likely take the brunt of Sandy while Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick is asking schools and universities throughout the Bay state to shut down in anticipation of the storm's arrival. In Rhode Island, Gov Chaffee and local officials have ordered mandatory evacuations for some of the low-lying coastal towns while in Virginia, Gov McDonnell activated 400 National Guardsmen over the weekend. In New York, Gov Cuomo ordered a shutdown of the New York City subway system as well as the MTA commuter rail and bus services effective Sunday night.

Announcement warning of service shutdown at the Long Island RR station in Hicksville, NY. Bruce Bennett/Getty Images

Public safety employees and utility workers have been warned that they should expect to be working extra shifts over the next several days and in the Big Apple, both the New York Stock Exchange and NASDAQ will be closed on Monday. The Statue of Liberty was slated to re-open to the public this weekend after undergoing a series of renovations, but the official re-open date has been pushed back in anticipation of Sandy's impact in the mid-Atlantic region. Not surprisingly, in addition to commuter rail, Sandy/Frankenstorm has already snarled air service throughout the Mid Atlantic region as thousands of flights have been cancelled. On Sunday, Amtrak announced cancellation of passenger service on the northeast corridor north of New York City while service on the Northeast Corridor between new York and Washignton DC is expected to grind to a halt effective Monday.

Sandy is also affecting the upcoming presidential election with both camps cancelling or postponing campaign stops in Virginia, Pennsylvania and New Hampshire.

Forecasters anticipate that Sandy/Frankenstorm will move inland in a similar trajectory to Hurrican/Tropical Storm Irene in late August 2011. Vermont and portions of upstate New York were particularly hard-hit, with heavily damaged roads, rail lines and bridges leaving villages in the Green Mountain state isolated from the rest of new England for as long as two weeks.

Blue State Graft Watch- Feds Arrest Trenton, NJ Mayor on Corruption Charges

After July's FBI raids on City Hall and the Mayor's residence in Trenton, NJ, many observers figured it would be only a matter of time before the Feds pressed charges against Democrat Trenton mayor Tony Mack and arrested him.

And they would be correct.

On September 10th, Mack was arrested by federal agents at his home on corruption charges linked to a city development project. Also taken into custody were Mack's brother Ralphiel and a prominent Mack campaign donor, Joseph "JoJo" Giorgianni.

"The investigation revealed evidence of a conspiracy among the defendants and other to corrupt certain functions of Trenton City government in favor of a purported developer seeking to building a parking garage on City-owned property in exchange for cash payments totaling approximate $119,000, a total of $54,000 that the defendants actually accepted in one way or another and another $65,000 that they anticipated accepting," according to the criminal complaint filed today.

The complaint indicates the FBI had been investigating Mack since September 2010, just a few months after he took office. At least two cooperating witnesses are cited in the complaint and the FBI made extensive use of wire taps on the phones of Mack, Giorgianni and the cooperating witnesses.

An informant working with the FBI, identified in the complaint as "CW-1," first met with Giorgianni on Sept. 14, 2010 claiming to represent a developer who wanted to build a parking garage on East State Street in the city. The confidential witness asked for Mack's help in securing the property in exchange for cash and Giorgianni agreed to broker the deal, the complaint states.

That conversation, which occurred two months after Mack's election, was recorded by the witness, according to the complaint.

"We want this," Giorgianni said, according to the complaint. "What do you think we did all this for? I like to make money for my friends. I like to do it like the Boss Tweed way. You know Boss Tweed ran Tamany Hall?"


Numerous meetings and conversations followed regarding the parking garage, but the project discussions slowed last year when a citizen's group mounted an effort to recall Mayor Mack. The recall fell short of the signatures needed.

"On April 18, 2011 at JoJo's Steakhouse, Giorgianni stated that Tony F. Mack was interested in engaging in the corrupt transaction previously discussed 'once this July thing's over,' referring to the efforts by certain Trenton citizens to recall Tony F. Mack," the complaint states. "Giorgianni stated 'Once that's over, we're ready to roll."

The bribes started to flow on Oct. 27, 2011 when Giorgianni accepted two envelopes with $1,500 each from the cooperating witness "with the express understanding that Giorgianni would give one of the envelopes to Tony F. Mack in exchange for Tony F. Mack's support of the development of the East State Street lot."

The July raids on City Hall, the mayor's home and Giorgianni's steakhouse reportedly stemmed from a phantom parking garage which was actually a paid parking lot in downtown Trenton that was sold to the city for $1 in 2000. The informant at Giorgianni's steakhouse had reportedly offered cash to both Giorgiani and Mack to arrange a meeting and help expedite the permit process for converting the current lot into a garage.

So far, Tony Mack faces just the single corruption charge, but more charges could be pending depending on what subsequent searches of City Hall, Mack's residence and Griogriani's steakhouse turn up.

Since taking office in 2010, Mack has been accused of using the city payroll as how own personal piggybank as well as steering larded up city contracts to friends, hiring and promoting unqualified relatives into various municipal positions. Earlier this year, Mack's half-brother who was appointed supervisor of Trenton's water utility pleaded guilty to using city employees and city owned equipment to carry out private work at the city's expense. A Mercer County judge had decided to revoke Mack's half brother's bail at the end of August.

It should also be worth pointing out that Mack is also a member of New York mayor Michael Bloomberg's 'Mayors against illegal guns' coalition.

Trenton is New Jersey's state capitol and 10th largest city.

Thunder on the Mountain- A Look At the Pennsylvania Town Thrust onto World Stage on September 11, 2001

Plume of smoke from Flight 93 crash in rural Somerset County, PA on September 11, 2001. Housewife Val McClatchey caught the image with a new digital camera just moments after impact.

Even before the September 11th terrorist attacks, cities like Washington DC and New York were in the crosshairs of terrorist and dangerous extremists. However, on America's darkest day an unassuming town of just over 200 people became etched in history as the final resting place for the first Americans to fight back against Al Qaeda.

For those of you unfamiliar with United Flight 93, the Newark to San Francisco flight took off on time that morning with four hijackers on board. At 9:28 AM- nearly 45 minutes after the first hijacked airliner slammed into the North Tower of the World Trade Center- Air Traffic Control in Cleveland, OH received a Mayday call from Flight 93 amidst what sounded like a struggle in the background. When Cleveland attempted to reach the flight crew by radio, they received no reply. The widow of Captain Jason Dahl believes that her husband took measures to interfere with the hijackers such as redirecting the planes radio frequency so that the hijacker's orders to the crew and passengers were instead transmitted to Air Traffic Controllers before he was stabbed.

Within five minutes of the hijacking, passengers were using in-flight phones or their own cellphones to contact family members or the authorities. By that point, the wife of passenger Tom Burnett had told him about watching the attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon from their California home. Burnett- a medical device company executive from San Ramon, CA told his wife Deena "Don't worry, we're going to do something". Marketing executive Jeremy Glick told his wife in West Milford, NJ that the passengers had voted to try and storm the cockpit and re-take the plane.

Todd Beamer, an executive with Oracle Inc from Highstown, NJ attempted to call his wife from one of the in-flight GTE phones. However, his call was instead rerouted to a GTE supervisor named Lisa Jefferson. Beamer became apprehensive at one point as the plane changed direction, but he and his fellow passengers had decided they were going to overpower their hijackers and try to take back the plane. Beamer told Jefferson that one of the hijackers claimed to have a bomb, but at this juncture the passengers figured it was a ruse to get them to comply with their orders before they realized they were going to be killed anyway. Jefferson and Beamer also recited the 23rd Psalm before the passengers and crew reportedly counterattacked with scalding water, a drink cart and their bare hands. The line was left open after Beamer was done talking to Jefferson and he was heard in the background urging on fellow passengers with "Let's roll!".

Audio from the black box recorded the sounds of a struggle between the hijackers and passengers in the cockpit before the plane crashed into a field outside of Shanksville, PA at 10:03 AM. Flight 93 was no more than 20 minutes away from Washington DC at the time of the crash. Subsequent Al Qaeda documents seized in Afghanistan and Pakistan seem to indicate that the US Capitol Building was the most likely target, although the White House was seriously considered as well.

Within minutes, firefighters and Pennsylvania State Troopers arrived at the Flight 93 crash site. Unlike the attacks on the Twin Towers in lower Manhattan and the Pentagon in northern Virginia, there was considerably less debris to sift through in the Shanksville meadow and a number of documents and evidence could be recovered by investigators- including remnants of the hijackers' passports.

A monument to Flight 93 passengers and crew erected by Newark-based flight attendants adjacent to a chapel south of Shanksville, PA.

In the ensuing weeks, investigators and media descended on the rural community. Flight 93 was carrying an estimated 5000 lbs of mail, and NTSB officials had recovered undamaged pieces of mail, in-flight magazines, a bible and even a business card from one of the hijackers identifying other accomplices in the attacks. The planes black boxes were reportedly recovered from a 15-25 foot deep crater in the ground.

Close-up of the monument

The immediate aftermath of the crash was caught by a Shanksville housewife named Val McClatchey who was watching the horror unfold in lower Manhattan and northern Virginia on TV when she heard a loud roaring overhead followed by what she described as a ground shaking boom. The image shows an ominous plume of smoke rising over a hill with a bucolic farmhouse and red barn in the foreground.

Thunder on the Mountain- the Flight 93 Memorial Chapel south of Shanksville, PA.

However, McClatchey's photo was also viewed by 9/11 'Truthers' [basically, unhinged conspiracy theorists who insist that the 9/11 attacks were singlehandedly orchestrated by the US government, Jews or the illuminati NANESB!] as an open invitation to harass and stalk the Pennsylvania housewife and real-estate agent.

The real estate agent has recently become a target of bloggers calling themselves "9-11 researchers," who are seeking to prove that the U.S. government was complicit in the attacks that brought down the Twin Towers, pierced the Pentagon and crashed United Airlines Flight 93. "The End of Serenity" has turned out to be their smoking gun.

They have visited Mrs. McClatchey's office and called her at home, posting satellite maps of her property and accusing her of digitally altering her photo to insert a fake smoke plume. The bloggers have picked apart her story, highlighting inconsistencies in different news accounts and questioning her motives. Others have described her as "surly," "hostile," "irate" and "defensive." People have called her at home, accusing her of being anti-American and of "holding the photo hostage."

[Gosh- only somebody with something to hide would be upset at random unhinged loons showing up on their doorstep out of the blue and accusing them of treason and complicity in a shadowy plot to murder thousands Americans- NANESB!]

A look at the recently-opened Flight 93 Memorial at the crash site north of Shanksville, run by the National Parks Service.

The field that Flight 93 crashed into had actually been reclaimed from a strip coal mining operation. Almost immediately after 9/11, people began leaving flowers and mementos at a chain link fence at a temporary memorial near the crash site.

Within a year, Congress had approved funding for a permanent memorial at the Shanksville crash site. The early design of the memorial was fraught with controversy when one of the finalists- Crescent of Embrace- was revealed and critics and relatives of those killed on Flight 93 thought it too closely resembled the crescent moon symbol popular with numerous Islamic groups. The Crescent was later modified into a semicircle bisected by the flight's path.

Marble panels engraved with the name of the 40 passengers and crew members of Flight 93 at the permanent memorial in Somerset County, PA

Stage one of the permanent memorial opened to the public on September 10th, 2011 and is operated under the National Parks Service. Currently, a gently sloping black wall accompanies a walkway and benches that stretch out to a memorial plaza where the names of the passengers and crew are inscribed on a marble wall. There are no plans for a memorial garden of any kind- National Park officials said that the Memorial would be better served by allowing the native wildflower species to bloom in the areas surrounding the plaza. Earlier this year, crews were planting trees along the road leading into the Flight 93 Memorial from US Highway 30 to the north

Even before the National Flight 93 Memoral opened up, the field had seen as many as 150,000 visitors per year. USA Today's Travel Section has even gone so far to reccommend including the recently opened memorial as part of an itinerary for visiting Southwestern Pennsylvania along with Pittsburgh (about 80 miles away), Frank Lloyd Wright's Falling Water (about 50 miles away) as well as the Rolling Rock Brewery in Latrobe and Horsehoe Curve in Altoona [OK- I just threw the last two in there- NANESB!]. Signs were recently posted on the Pennsylvania Turnpike and US Route 219 to direct people to the memorial.

Future plans for the Memorial call for additional structures to house permanent exhibits and artifacts from passengers and their families to be completed sometime in 2013- currently there is just the one structure before the Memorial plaza where visitors can sign in. Plans also call for a tower with 40 seperate wind chimes to be built near the Memorial entrance- one for each passenger and crew member. Since the meadow is near high mountain peaks, there's a near constant wind or breeze blowing through the site.

Through a series of odd coincidences, a wind turbine farm overlooking the entrance to the Flight 93 Memorial opened up a little over a month after the 9/11 attacks. The executive who made the Somerset County wind turbines possible- Nicholas Humber- was killed in the 9/11 attacks. Humber was a passenger on American Airlines Flight 11 when it slammed into the North Tower of the World Trade Center.

The US Navy has also christened the USS Somerset- a San Antonio class amphibious transport dock named after Somerset County where Flight 93 went down. A bucket from a nearby power shovel that had been used in coal mining was melted down in 2008 to form the bow stem for the Somerset and she was christened in July of this year in Avondale, LA. Sister ships USS New York and USS Arlington had incorporated steel from the World Trade Center site and Pentagon respectively.

Blue State Graft Watch Update- FBI Raids Home of Trenton, NJ Mayor

Federal agents armed with a search warrant raided the home of the mayor of New Jersey's capital city as well as his brother, an address listed one of the mayor's top donors and City Hall in the early morning hours of Thursday last week.

The raid on Mack’s residence in the upscale Berkeley Square section of the city was augmented by FBI searches at the home of Mack’s brother Ralphiel, the head football coach at Trenton Central High School, and the Ewing residence of Joseph “JoJo” Giorgianni

Later that day, Trenton, NJ's Democrat mayor Tony Mack sent a letter to the city clerk designating Ternton's Business Administrator Sam Hutchinson as acting mayor; a pro-forma move that allows Mack to leave the city. In a message on his Facebook page dated Sunday night, Mack said that he would be out of town and wouldn't be returning until July 30th.

A spokeswoman from the FBI declined to state what agents were looking for when they carried out raids on Mack's residence and City Hall. Although Mack has yet to be formally charged, his time in office as mayor has been marked by accusations of cronyism, his appointees being convicted of misconduct or having to step down once their criminal backgrounds were discovered.

City Councilman George Muschal, a frequent critic of Mack's management of the city, said he was not surprised when he received a text message notifying him that the FBI was raiding City Hall this morning. He only asked one question:

“What took them so long to get there?” Muschal said when reached by phone this afternoon. "There is full blown corruption in the city of Trenton. We have to go to a rock bottom low before we can rebuild. This might be a rock bottom low.”

A number of employees have sued the administration, including a former recreation employee who alleged that a close Mack associate, acting public works director Harold Hall, acted to bypass public bidding requirements and hired unqualified friends and relatives.

The FBI has investigated a political action committee that funneled donations to Mack, but the mayor has not been known to be under investigation personally.

One of the homes raided was that of 'Jojo' Giorgianni, a local steakhouse owner who was convicted of molesting a 14 year old girl in his restaurant in 1978. Tipping the scales at more than 500 pounds, Giorgianni and his legal team pleaded that he would be unable to survive in prison due to his considerable girth- an argument the presiding judge ruled in favor of until a videotape of the newly-freed Giorgianni ringside at a boxing match in smoke-filled arena without his oxygen tank was shown. Giorgianni reportedly exceeded the legal campaign contribution limit when he donated to Mack's 2010 Mayoral campaign.

In January, Mack's half-brother who was a manager at the city's water utility pleaded guilty to two counts of official misconduct after investigators discovered he was using city employees and city-owned equipment to carry out private side jobs while billing the city.

Other highlights of Tony Mack's two years in office include his chief-of-staff assaulting a police officer while carrying heroin in his pocket just days after leaving the scene of an accident, disguising a $20,000 campaign contribution as a loan, awarding municipal contracts to campaign donors, disbanding the police department's anti-gang and anti-narcotic units for more foot patrols and circumventing the city council to appoint friends and family to jobs within different city agencies.

Separately, the Mercer County prosecutor's office announced that they had a number of ongoing investigations over corruption in Trenton. They had successfully prosecuted Mack's half brother in the Trenton Water Works investigation earlier this year.

Like convicted felons Kwame Kilpatrick, Rod Blagojevic and Eddie Perez, Tony Mack is also a member of the Mike Bloomberg-sponsored Mayors Against Illegal Guns coalition.

Blue State Graft Watch- FBI Arrests New Jersey Mayor and Son For Hacking Opposition Website

The Democrat mayor of West New York, NJ along with his son were arrested by the FBI on Wednesday on charges that they hacked a website calling for the mayor's recall and intimidated people who were associated with the page.

The FBI alleges that Joseph Roque, Mayor Felix Roque's 22 year old son, was able to successfully hack into an email account of one of the unnamed victims and then use the email account to cancel the registration of the domain name recallroque.com.

After RecallRoque.com was taken down, the criminal complaint says, Roque placed a telephone call to the proprietor of the website — “Victim 1,” a government official in Hudson County, N.J. — to say that the page had been taken down by “high government officials and that everyone would pay for getting involved against Mayor Roque.”

Roque also allegedly tried to intimidate those involved with the website, telling “Victim 1” that he had a friend on the CIA: “A friend of mine. he works in the — I can’t tell you — three letters — CIA. You know. That’s how I get information. So what I’m doing is not very kosher.”

The mayor of the city of 50,000 and his son are expected to appear in federal court on Thursday where they will face charges of gaining unauthorized access to computers in furtherance of causing damage to protected computers; causing damage to protected computers; and conspiracy to commit those crimes.

Roque himself attempted to gather signatures for a recall of then-incumbent mayor Silverio Vega in 2010, but half the signatures he gathered were deemed invalid.

Today's Train of Thought- Apple of My Eye, April 15, 2012

Today's train of thought takes us to the Garden State, whose monicker isn't being used in an ironic or facetous sense this time around.

Although split up by competitors Norfolk Southern and CSX Transportation in 1999, Conrail is technically still around in the form of Conrail Shared Assets operations. Unlike the mainlines belonging to Conrail and their predecessors, Conrail Shared Assets Operations performs switching and the running of local freights on behalf of CSX and Norfolk Southern to prevent either railroad from gaining a monopoly in some of the markets Conrail had prevously operated in. This includes ports and branchlines along the northeast corridor in the Philadelphia and Jersey City area as well as Detroit- although CSX or Norfolk Southern equipment is routinely used.

Here, railpictures.net contributor Gerald Oliveto caught CSX GP38-2 #2577 trundling past some crabapple trees in bloom with a Conrail Shared Assets local freight in the quiet north Jersey burgh of Helmetta, NJ on April 24, 2008. The train originated in Browns Yard in Sayreville, NJ (and still operated by Conrail Shared Assets) and is travelling along the former Pennsylvania Railroad Amboy Secondary, which was once electrified. Although the wires came down sometime in the 1990s, the catenary poles are still standing along the route.

Whitney Houston: 1963-2012

Singer Whitney Houston was found unresponsive in her Beverly Hills hotel room on Saturday afternoon and pronounced dead shortly after paramedics arrived.

The 48 year old singer has been described as having a voice for the ages, tarnished by addiction and an abusive relationship with ex-husband Bobby Brown.

Born and raised in New Jersey, Houston followed in her mother's footsteps and began performing in a gospel choir in Newark's New Hope Baptist Church.

Houston first achieved noteriety in the late 1980s- sports fans will best remember Houston's flawless performance of 'The Star Spangled Banner' before Super Bowl XXV in 1991.



Her rendition of the national anthem was so successful, it was re-released as a single and enjoyed great commercial success. Houston then reportedly donated the proceeds from the single's sales to the American Red Cross.

Houston also appeared in a number of movies throughout the 1990s and married Bobby Brown, although by the late 1990s a number of missed performances and rapid wieight loss led to reports of drug use. The trainwreck that was her marriage to Bobby Brown was the subject of a 2004 reality show on the Bravo Network.

Brown and Houston seperated in 2006 and Houston enjoyed something of a comeback in recent years. She was scheduled to perform at a gathering for music executives before the Grammys this weekend.

Today's Train of Thought- Garden Spot in the Garden State

Today's Train of Thought takes us to New Jersey, although thankfully it's quite a ways removed from the filming venue for The Jersey Shore.

Although many people from the NYC/tri-state area have been known to flock to northern New England or upstate New York during autumn to take in the fall colors, some might be surprised to learn that New Jersey has its share of foliage. Back in the late 1980s and through most of the 1990s, the New York, Susquehanna & Western would run excursion trains through its lines in Northwestern New Jersey via Sparta Jct. Today, the NYS&W Technical & Historical Society operated excursions year-round over the Belvedere & Delaware River railroad in the western corner of the Garden State.

Of course, the business of hauling freight doesn't stop just because the leaves are changing color [altho' enough leaves accumulating on the rails can lead to slippery rails- NANESB!] and eastern New Jersey is home to some very busy yards and intermodal facilities.

Here, railpictures.net contributor Nick Anshant caught Norfolk Southern C40-8 #8705 heading eastbound through some of the Garden State foliage at Neshanic Station, NJ on October 25, 2009. The burly 4000 HP standard-cab GE is powering St Louis to Elizabeth, NJ intermodal train 22V under a canopy of green-orange-gold leaves on the former Lehigh Valley line linking New Jersey with eastern Pennsylvania.

Blue State Graft Watch: Securities Firm Run by Former New Jersey Governor and Obama Bundler John Corzine to be Probed by FBI

The MF Global Securities firm run by former New Jersey Governor and Goldman Sachs [NYSE: GS] chairman John Corzine will be investigated by the FBI to determine if the firms actions violated criminal laws after filing for bankruptcy protection on Monday. MF's bankruptcy was reportedly the 8th largest filing in US History.

After taking over MF Global last year, Corzine led MF Global to make more trades for the company's own profits, a practice known as proprietary trading. Proprietary trading helped turn Goldman into a trading powerhouse in recent years.

Under Corzine's leadership, MF Global bet $6.3 billion on debt issued by Italy, Spain and other European nations with troubled economies. Those bonds have lost value in recent weeks as fears have intensified that some European countries might default.

Regulators said in September that MF Global was overvaluing some of its European debt investments. It required the company to raise more cash, according to court papers filed on Monday.

Corzine reportedly continued to use clients money as losses from the European sovereign debt MF invested in increased.

Reports had also been circulating as recently as a few months ago that Corzine was a possible replacement for current US Treasury secretary Tim Geithner should President Obama win a second term. In fact, these rumors led to an oddly specific stipulation in a $325 million bond offering from MF.

MF creditors were so concerned that Corzine might quit to take a White House post that they demanded an “Obama clause” be inserted in a $325 million bond offering -- in which MF would shell out an extra 1 percent in interest if Corzine left for a government post by 2013.

Oddly, the regulator in charge of investigating the wreckage of Corzine's securities firm worked at Goldman Sachs with Corzine and donated $10,000 the the Democrat party of New Jersey when Corzine was running for governor in 2005.

In 2009, Corzine lost re-election to Republican challenger and former US Attorney Chris Christie despite a number of high profile campaign appearances with President Obama stumping on behalf of the incumbent.

More recently, however, Corzine has gone on to become one of the top bundlers for Obama's 2012 campaign, raising at least $500,000 by many estimates.

A recent list of top “bundlers” or elite fundraisers released by Obama’s campaign listed Corzine in the highest category -- reporting that he had raised more than $500,000 for the campaign. A substantial chunk of those funds were collected at a $35,800 per ticket fundraiser that Corzine hosted at his wife’s spacious Fifth Avenue apartment last April -- an event that was touted at the time as part of a concerted effort by the president’s campaign team to reach out to well-heeled Wall Street donors who had been alienated by some of his policies and previous public comments.

In the meantime, an estimated $700 million in funds from MF Securities remains unaccounted for.

The Obama Administration had promised to return monetary donations from Corzine [although they didn't clarify if it was Corzine's $5000 maximum individual contribution or the contributions in excess of $500,000 that Corzine helped bundle from other wealthy donors- NANESB!] earlier this week.

I find it quite telling that the whole #Occupy Wall Street movement claimed they had taken to the streets to protest nationwide about the greed and excess on Wall Street embodied by Corzine's actions at MF Securities, but have remained remarkably silent about Corzine and the primary benefactor of his largess, President Obama.

Joseph Trombino- The Brinks Guard Who Crossed Paths With Terrorists Before 9/11

While I was researching another subject, the background of an unassuming Brinks armoured truck guard piqued my attention. Francis J Trombino- known by many as simply 'Joe'- was a Korean war vet and truck driver who had been with Brinks since the late 1960s and lived most of his life in Clifton, NJ. He was killed on the morning of September 11th, 2001 when two World Trade Center towers collapsed.

But that sunny September morning was not the first time Trombino had crossed paths with terrorists. In 1993, his armoured truck had left the WTC complex a few hours before Islamic terrorist Ramzi Yousef drove an explosives-laden rental van into the underground parking garage and set the fuse.

However, before either of the Islamist attacks on the World Trade Center site, Trombino survived a deadly ambush and robbery from Weather Underground and black sepratist gunmen nearly 20 years before the 9/11 attacks.

As Trombino and fellow guard Peter Paige were picking up money from Nanuet Mall in Rockland County, NY, in October 1981 when masked gunmen burst from a nearby van and opened fire with shotguns and an M-16 rifle, killing Paige instantly. Trombino was able to get off a round before being struck in the shoulder, arm and upper body multiple times.

After swapping vehicles, the domestic terrorists would then try and shoot their way through a roadblock set up by police in West Nyack, NY, killing two police officers and wounding another before trying to flee on foot or carjack motorists.

Trombino's injuries would require multiple surgeries- he nearly lost his arm in the gunfight. Brinks reassigned him as a driver where he would continue to work for another 19 years. According to family, Joe hardly complained about the surgeries and therapy, telling them that 'These things are a part of life'.

Joe Trombno was about a year away from retirement on the morning of September 11th. According to co-workers, he stayed in the underground garage with his truck when the planes hit, calling the Brinks dispatcher and inquiring about the whereabouts of the gurads who had gone into the WTC buildings to make a pickup (they had managed to escape but had no means of communication). Trombino told the Brinks office in his last phone call that water was starting to seep in and the walls were starting to crumble around him.

Francis J Trombino left behind a wife of 42 years, two daughters and three grandchildren.

Tropical Storm Irene Aftermath Iron Horse Roundup September 6, 2011

Pan Am ballast train in Greenfield, MA en route to washout at Charlemont, MA on Aug 30th- photo Billy Wehmeyer

Hurricane Irene struck the Berkshires on Aug 28th and there was sizable washouts on Pan Am's former Boston & Maine Fitchburg Division between Ayer, MA and Mechanichsville, NY along the Deerfield River between North Adams and Shelburne, MA. With slow orders in effect for a number of locations, crews were able to get the line reopened by the evening of August 31.

Canadian Pacific's former Delaware & Hudson mainline between Albany NY and Binghamton NY suffered a number of washouts, forcing some trains to be rerouted via CSX's (suddenly ironically named) Water Level route west of Schenectady, NY all the way to Syracuse where they were redirected to Binghampton on the New York Susquehana & Western's Northern Division.

The Canadian Pacific line between Saratoga Springs and the Canadian border at Rouses Point, NY (and on to Montreal from there) suffered minimal flooding and obstruction and for the most part remained open. Besides through freight from CP Rail, the line also hosts Amtrak's Adirondack New York City to Montreal service.

After work was completed on a damaged section of track in Central Bridge, NY, Canadian Pacific resumed operations on the D&H Bridge Line between Albany and Binghaton NY on September 1.

CSX's Selkirk NY to Buffalo Water Level route was flooded, but reopened after a few days while the line along the West shore of the Hudson River experienced a number of floods, washouts and landslides. Crews reportedly had managed to get the line reopened by the early morning hours of August 30th. A CSX service bulletin dated September 3 reports that MOW and signalmen have been working to restore tracks, crossing signals and roadbed throughout affected areas in Pennsylvania, New York, Massachusetts, New Jersey and Maryland.

The New England Central's former Central Vermont Railway line still remains closed between White River Jct and Essex Jct, VT. Curiously, Amtrak's Vermonter service wasn't affected because passengers for north of Springfield, MA would be served by bus due to ongoing track upgrades along the New England Central since June. The NECR between Essex Jct and the Canadian National interchange in Swanton, VT to the north remains open as well as the line to the south between White River Jct and New London, CT.

Although no timetable for reopening the line between White River Jct and Essex Jct has been announced, a service bulletin dated September 2nd announced a detour train was scheduled to deliver cars to the Canadian National on September 9th.

Washout on the Vermont Railway line in Sunderland between Rutland and North Bennington, VT. Photo- Tim Stockwell

Undoubtedly the hardest hit railroad was the Vermont Railway system, with all of their lines radiating out of Rutland, VT flooded or washed out at some point along the way. The former Delaware & Hudson line between the Canadian Pacific interchange at Whitehall NY and Rutland was the first to re-open, with Amtrak's Ethan Allen resuming service on September 1. The line north between Rutland and Burlington was reopened on Aug 31, with a fuel train to Burlington, VT being the first train through.

However, things were different to the east and south of Rutland. The line south to Bennington, VT and on to the Pan-Am interchange in Hoosick Falls, NY was hit by several washouts. The Green Mountain line between Rutland and Bellows Falls, VT was much worse off and will likely take several weeks to repair.

Vermont's state-owned rail lines have been heavily damaged by Tropical Storm Irene.

An inspection found that five of the state's railroad bridges have major structural damage and need major repairs before they can re-open to freight traffic.

The middle piers of one bridge on the Connecticut River line in Hartford was moved more than 6 feet by rushing floodwaters. Yesterday, a crane was sent to stabilize that bridge, and allow work crews to install temporary shoring.

The Green Mountain line and the Vermont Rail South line rail beds have also seen a number of washouts, culvert failures and erosion of the rail bed.

Freight traffic is still running between Burlington and Rutland, and the Ethan Allen Amtrak line resumed service on Saturday.

Vermont Rail Systems estimates it will be three to four weeks before freight begins moving again on the Green Mountain rail line.

It appears that the Vermont Railway has put a priority on getting the Green Mountain route open so that Canadian Pacific bridge traffic to the New England Central and Providence & Worcester can resume as well as providing a viable detour route while the New England Central line north of White River Jct. is being repaired.

Crews from Vermont Railway and contractor RJ Corman were reportedly dumping ballast and rip-rap along washed away sections of track between Rockingham, VT and Wallingford, VT using hi-rail equipped dump trucks. Structural engineers are also attempting to shore up bridges that were compromised by the flash floods.

The Washington County (a subsidiary of the Vermont Railway) line between Newport, VT and White River Jct is intact, but WACR/VTR power is 'marooned' in from the rest of the system in Bellows Falls or White River Jct. For the time being, the WACR is borrowing a B39-8 from the Montreal, Maine and Atlantic to serve customers on the line. Until the New England Central line reopens and engineers shore up the damaged bridges around White River Juntion, the only interchange is with the MM&A at Newport, VT where the line heads northwest to Farnham, Quebec.

Green Mountain Railway Alco RS-1 shoving on rear of empty ethanol tank train past Bartonsville covered bridge, April 2011.

While not part of the Vermont Railway System, the photogenic Bartonsville covered bridge (above) adjacent to Vermont Route 103 and the Green Mountain Railway was popular with railway enthusiasts and tourists. Perhaps the most iconic image of the damage Irene had wrought on the Green Mountain state, the covered bridge was captured on video being washed away by the raging torrent of the Williams River by a local resident.

Location of Bartonsville covered bridge after Irene- Both photos from Kevin Burkholder

While the bridge was insured by the village of Bartonsville for $1 million, the polity only covered the wooden structure but not the abutments which will need further repair. A fund for replacing the bridge has been set up on the Rockingham-Bellows Falls town website.

The New York, Susquehanna & Western experienced some flood damage to their right-of-way in northern New Jersey between their Little Ferry, NJ hub and Port Jervis, NY. However, there was no damage reported to the Southern Tier line between Binghampton NY and Port Jervis and their Northern Division between Binghamton and Syracuse, NY also managed to survive intact. The Susquehanna was able to resume operations on their Sparta Jct NJ-Little Ferry, NJ line by September 1.

In the Catskills, the Catskill Mountain Railway is expected to resume operations out of Mount Tremper, operating excusrions on a modified route beginning September 10. Meanwhile, just to the north, a notice on the Delaware & Ulster website announced that the railway was shut down until further notice due to flash flooding from Irene.

Over in rural Washington County NY, the 33-mile Batten Kill railroad suffered some flooding from its namesake river and fallen trees along the right of way, but suffered no washouts or damage to its bridges. While the line remained open after Tropical storm Irene passed, interchange with the Pan Am Railway at Eagle Bridge, NY was limited due to flood damage from the swollen Deerfield River that railway suffered on the line between North Adams, MA and Shelburne, MA.

Despite the damage inflicted to railroads to the immediate north and west, Canaan, CT-based Housatonic Railroad experienced minimal disruptions on their line through Westernmost Massachusetts and Connecticut from Tropical storm Irene.