Rare catch on a doomed segment of the Ashland Sub

Canadian National SD40-2 no. 5953, an ex–Kansas City Southern unit still in its predecessor’s blue and yellow paint, leads a northbound mixed freight toward Ashland on the former Soo Line Ashland Subdivision. The consist includes mostly empty pulpwood flats, along with a few boxcars and tank cars, typical of the light forest-products traffic still moving over the line at the time. Photographed on a hot Independence Day afternoon, this train represents one of the final recorded revenue movements north of Park Falls before service was suspended following severe washouts in the July 2016 floods.