SD40-2's On The Prairie: Chasing the Rapid City, Pierre, & Eastern across Minnesota [4K]

Since 2014, the Rapid City, Pierre, & Eastern Railroad has operated the former Alco Line of the Chicago & North Western across Minnesota, South Dakota, Wyoming, and Nebraska. Famous in the C&NW days for running unique Alco locomotives, this line became the Dakota, Minnesota, and Eastern after the C&NW pulled out. Becoming part of Canadian Pacific in 2008, CP sold off the line west of Tracy, Minnesota to shortline holding company Genesee & Wyoming in 2014, who created the new RCP&E. Using almost exclusively SD40-2's for power, the line has prospered under G&W ownership. Though RCP&E owned trackage ends in Tracy, the RCP&E has trackage rights across the CP to Mankato, MN where they interchange with Union Pacific. Running three times a week, RCP&E sends a train out of Aurora, South Dakota to Mankato on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, with the train returning to Aurora on Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday. On July 8th, I headed up to shoot the M-MNAU, running with a pair of SD40-2 locomotives. Once abundant, these locomotives have been largely retired on the Class I railroads, and these RCP&E units are set to be replaced with GE Dash-9's in the coming months. Running on borrowed time, these units put on quite the show pulling 85 cars. As someone who grew up watching endless SD40-2's on the IC&E and CP, seeing these workhorses at their best in 2025 was quite the site. The leader, RCP&E 3421, is ex-IC&E 6424, so theres a good chance I saw this very locomotive wearing blue and gold many years ago. With great scenery, weather, and power, it was a no-brainer that I chased this train 150 miles from Mankato to the South Dakota border, with my last shot being at the iconic Hole-In-Mountain wildlife preserve in Lake Benton, MN. 0:00 Mankato 3:03 Judson 3:24 Cambria 3:53 New Ulm 4:40 Sleepy Eye 5:21 Springfield 6:10 Walnut Grove 7:29 Tracy 9:09 Florence 10:40 Lake Benton