With less than a year on the timer for through trains, a typical for the time) 135 presses up the mountain on the S-Line to Asheville. After a torrential downpour, the train would have to crawl on its knees to get around the curve at low fill before finally picking up speed around high fill.
Today, only two locals traverse this incredible section of railroading engineering, which may eventually be converted to full dark territory between Asheville and Statesville.