Jan 29, 2000 - 06:30 PM

Norfolk Southern to Lay off 550 Workers

The Associated Press

ROANOKE, Va. (AP) - Norfolk Southern Corp. is laying off 550 union workers, blaming falling revenue, high diesel prices and a weak export coal market.

Company officials confirmed the layoffs Friday, just two days after Norfolk Southern announced an early retirement program for 1,200 nonunion employees. The company has about 35,000 employees.

The layoffs, set to take effect next Friday, affect track and machine workers who belong to the Brotherhood of Maintenance of Way and are scattered across the Norfolk-based railroad's 12 divisions in 22 states, mostly east of the Mississippi River.

Diesel prices, coupled with problems associated with the company's takeover of Conrail last year, caused Norfolk Southern's fourth-quarter profits to plunge 81 percent to $31 million, or 8 cents a share.

Spokeswoman Susan Bland said the layoffs had more to do with business conditions, including a decline in the export coal market to Asia.

She said more layoffs could follow.

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Ray AP-ES-01-29-00 1828EST ) Copyright 2000 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. Brought to you by the Tampa Bay Online Network

-- Ray (ray@totacc.com), January 29, 2000

Answers

Ray,

Is the US really exporting coal to China? Why? How Much? I thought they had their own coal.

Todd

-- Todd Detzel (detzel@jps.net), January 29, 2000.

For those not familiar with railroad unions and their turf, the Maintenance of Way workers are responsible for the upkeep of the railroad's trackage. Can you say, "Deferred maintenance"?

-- Sure M. Hopeful (Hopeful@future.com), January 29, 2000.

Well considering I've seen 2 trains move here in the past month, I can't say that I'm surprised they are letting folks go, but would rather see them maintaining these qualified professionals to get NS up and running again. This is terrible for the families of these workers. I wish I knew the true story, cause it certainly does not add up. Last I heard New England was complaining about NOT receiving coal shipments and so stock piles were dwindling. If diesel shortages impact trucking, then more companies will explore alternatives, one of which is shipping by train.

Currently the number of coal trains that I've been commenting on since rollover have yet to pull outta town. They all have nice blankets of snow covering the coal from last week's storm.

Don't know why I'm wasting time scratching my head on this one; I'm sure the .mil/NG could easily step in and pick up the slack if there really was a problem anyway.

-- Hokie (Hokie_@hotmail.com), January 29, 2000.

"Is the US really exporting coal to China? Why? How Much? I thought they had their own coal."

Just a guess, I have no special knowledge or connection with this issue: Might the Asian market need our "hard" or anthracite coal, much cleaner burning than "soft" or bituminous? Certainly the air pollution in China is awful, in part because they do burn lots of coal (bituminous? Anyone know?) with often no or insufficient pollution control.

Just a guess.

--Andre in southcentral Pennsylvania

-- Andre Weltman (72320.1066@compuserve.com), January 30, 2000.

US coal exports fall into two classes: "steam coal", used as fuel in coal-fired power plants and metalurgic or "met coal", used as the starting point to produce coke for steelmaking.

Most coal exported from the US for many years has been "met coal". US met coal is the highest quality of all met coal found in the world. But its export rises and falls with the worldwide demand for steel.

As far as steam coal exports, they are mostly from western mines in Canada, Wyoming, Utah, New Mexico and Colorado for use in asian countries. However new mines in Indonesia and China have suppressed the demand for US-mined steam coal.

Of course, Klintoon's closing-off of promising new coal tracts in Utah gave the market to his patrons, the Riadys of Indonesia and probably some bigwigs in China, too. Then again, US mines can't compete when they have to PAY the miners instead of using prison slave labor like the Chinese do.

But Klintoon's land closure must be reversed before US railroads have to be used to haul IMPORTED Chinese or Indonesian coal from ports to the power plants.

WW

-- Wildweasel (vtmldm@epix.net), January 30, 2000.