Coal's mark

When I got this overhead view of an empty coal barge, it reminded me of a conversation I had with someone who worked for either CSX or Norfolk Southern way back in the 1990s.

We were talking about rail cars that haul coal. He said coal can corrode steel, which is why some old coal cars looked pretty bad.

You can see in this photo what several years of hauling coal leaves behind on a river barge.

For those who wonder, I blurred out the ID number of the barge so it didn't look like I'm trying to make any one company look bad.