The elevator loaded 224 hopper cars of durum over two days
By Diego Flammini
Staff Writer
Farms.com
A Saskatchewan grain elevator has provided one of Canada’s national railways with its largest grain load to date.
The South West Terminal (SWT) location in Antelope, Sask., loaded 224 Canadian Pacific (CP) hopper cars of durum over two days. The facility sent 22,223 metric tonnes of grain to the Port of Thunder Bay in the shipment.
The accomplishment is the result of years of hard work and planning, said Money Reich, general manager of SWT.
“It’s something we’ve worked on for a while with CP,” he told Farms.com. “It takes some time, coordination and effort from both parties. Any time you can do something that’s a little bit different, it’s very satisfying for everyone involved.”
Recent infrastructure upgrades helped make the record-setting load possible.
The terminal underwent upgrades to be able to load such a large train, Reich said.
“We expanded about five years ago,” he said. “Our site can’t accommodate a loop track because we don’t have enough room between the CP main lane and the Trans Canada Highway. We expanded each of our three tracks by 8,500 feet (2,590 metres) so we had enough room to get these large trains out.”
CP praised SWT for its efforts in making the shipment possible.
The railway “congratulates South West Terminal for successfully loading the longest single-origin grain train with its 224-car train,” Joan Hardy, CP’s vice-president of sales and marketing of grain and fertilizers, said in a June 5 statement. “SWT’s investment is creating capacity for grain farmers and the entire supply chain.”
The large shipment wouldn’t have been possible without producers.
The fact farmers can produce the grain to fill a train of that size speaks volumes about how good they are at what they do, Reich said.
“Farmers are extremely resilient and we’ve (faced) some tough conditions out here the last couple years,” he said. Producers “adapt to change, are able to invest in their crops and help put us in a position to transport their grain to ports for export.”
SWT photo