Caption: On 1982-05-29, a major fire on the swing span of the Fraser River Railway Bridge between New Westminster and Surrey brought the multi-user rail traffic to a halt for a long time. BC Hydro’s Valley Freight from New Westminster to Huntingdon utilized a detour route over CP’s New Westminster, Cascade and Mission subdivisions to gain access to their own track at Abbotsford, and due to restrictions on one small portion near New Westminster, were required to use four-axle power on detours. Thus, an eastward detour leaving Haney on Wednesday 1982-06-09 had BCH 152 (MP15DC) + 906 + 908 (SW900s) + 153 (MP15DC) as they crossed Kanaka Creek on CP rails at 1559 PDT.

BN and CN ran over the same detour route, a bonanza for railway photographers and Kodak. Having relocated from Vancouver Island to Port Coquitlam just a few months earlier, I was delighted with the many opportunities.