General Electric "Pooches"

My one and only up-close-and-personal contact with Amtrak's big Pooches was on the platform at El Paso, Texas, one hot summer evening in August of 1987. By then, the P30s had been assigned to only two long-distance runs requiring their might: the eastern Auto Train and the western Sunset Limited. We had passage on the eastbound latter. El Paso must have been a crew change point, because we held at the station long enough for all three of us Hawkins to walk the length of the train and see the locomotives. To this 13-year-old railfan, the pair of Pooches in charge of the Sunset seemed like monsters. Big, boxy, muscular — the patina of diesel exhaust and desert dust made them look like something out of a Mad Max movie more than an Amtrak brochure. Perched high on those C-C trucks, they meant business. I was impressed. Soon, the conductor's call came down the platform, and we were back on our way home to New Orleans in our family bedroom suite. But not before the Old Man posed me next to the lashup and snapped my photo with his Twin Lens Reflex. These days, the Pooches get a lot of hate online for their utilitarian appearance. I get it. They are not the prettiest faces in Amtrak's long lineup of power. But I still like them. Like a sturdy canine: tall and strong to a point just shy of intimidating. They also sounded great all wound up. But maybe I'm biased. After all, I have a pair of them to thank for taking care of my first long-distance overland experience in the Superliners. Los Angeles to New Orleans, the full run. Pooches for the win, I say.