On special days when the Conowingo Dam lowers its reservoir, something strange emerges from the murky depths of the Susquehanna River. Just below Susquehannock State Park’s Hawk Point, the water thins to a bronze translucence, and the top of a railroad hopper car rises from the river like the ribcage of some industrial leviathan. The current drifts around its metallic shell, sunlight striking the steel crossbeams, and for a moment, the past is visible in the shallows.
Then the river rises again, swallowing it whole.
For decades, locals have swapped stories about how a Penn Central Samuel Rea Shops 4600 Covered Hopper ended up twenty yards offshore at Fites Eddy. No official railroad record has surfaced, no newspaper ever reported the accident, and train crews who once worked the Port Road spoke of the incident only as a rumor. But among the handful of oral accounts that survive, one story stands apart for its detail and plausibility.
According to former railroaders, the accident likely occurred in the late 1970s during Penn Central’s turbulent final years. Engineer Robert “Bob” Pentland and conductor Joe Kuhn were hauling a solid grain train south toward Baltimore on the Columbia & Port Deposit Branch, better known as the Port Road. As they approached CP Midway near Susquehannock State Park, the train caught an approach signal followed by a stop at the home signal. Anyone familiar with older freight cars knows what came next: the danger of a “kicker,” a misbehaving air brake that could trigger a violent run-in. When Pentland applied the brakes, the entire train lurched forward and slammed together, setting off an emergency application.
Kuhn climbed down to walk the train in the dark. Somewhere near the middle, he found an air hose separated. He laced it back up, walked to the rear, found no derailment, and returned to the head end. With the brakes restored, the crew received a signal and continued toward Baltimore, unaware that the run-in had done more than pop a hose. It had thrown an entire hopper car out of the train and into the Susquehanna River. The remaining cars rolled back together, hiding the gap, and the train continued on as if nothing had happened. Not until days later, when crews reviewed the train’s consist—the lineup of every car in the order it should appear—did anyone realize they were one car short.
The railroad never retrieved it.
A loaded hopper on a sloping riverbank can sink fast, and removing it would have required cranes, barges, and a shutdown of the line. Penn Central was already struggling in those years, and the simplest option was to leave the car where it lay and let the river take it.
Yet the hopper did not disappear. Instead, it settled on something unexpected.
Nearly half a century later, when a Conowingo drawdown exposed the car, Susquehanna Rambler Jay Mackley and a friend surveyed the site with a depth finder. The readings were peculiar. To the east, the bottom rose; to the west, it dropped away sharply. But beneath the hopper itself lay a perfectly level bench, as if the car were resting on a forgotten roadbed. Mackey concluded that the hopper had come to rest on the original alignment of the Columbia & Port Deposit Railroad, a route built in the mid-1800s before the Susquehanna was raised behind the Conowingo Dam.
The theory makes perfect sense.
When Conowingo Dam was constructed between 1926 and 1928, the rising reservoir threatened to drown the Port Road. To save the line, Norfolk & Western workers raised the railroad by roughly twelve feet above the new full-pool level. The original alignment disappeared beneath the water, along with the old town of Conowingo. Upward of 5,000 workers toiled on the dam project, dozens of whom lost their lives. When the reservoir filled, it stretched fourteen miles upriver and covered nine thousand acres, hiding roads, farms, bridges, and the old rail grade under its surface.
Today, the abandoned alignment still runs below the reservoir like a long, drowned spine. And on that forgotten shelf lies the hopper car, perfectly preserved in the cold, oxygen-poor water.
Understanding how a railcar could simply “jump” out of a moving train requires a look at freight physics. Long trains develop slack: tiny gaps in the couplings between cars. When brakes are applied suddenly, the cars slam forward in a “run-in.” If the force is great enough, a loaded car can lift off the rails or shift laterally. With enough momentum, and on a curve or embankment beside a river, that force can spill a car downslope. In this case, the Port Road hugs the Susquehanna so tightly that only a few feet separate the train from a steep bank that plunges into the water. A hopper ejected with the right angle and velocity could dive straight off the tracks and into the river without derailing the cars ahead or behind.
This is likely what happened that night. A hidden accident, unnoticed, unreported, and swallowed by the river before the crew even reached Perryville.
Today, the hopper remains a fixture of the Susquehanna’s underwater landscape. Most days, it is invisible, resting just beneath the water’s surface, but during drawdowns, the river falls away just enough for the car to reemerge. Kayakers paddle out to stand on its exposed beams. Boaters circle it like a shipwreck. Armchair explorers can view it on Google Maps.
A relic of Penn Central. A ghost of the Port Road. A reminder of how the river swallows what it pleases—and occasionally returns it.
Did You Know?
The Conowingo Dam reservoir covers the original town of Conowingo, once located along the riverbank at the old U.S. Route 1 bridge. When the dam was filled in 1928, the town was moved uphill, the bridge was demolished, and Route 1 was rerouted across the top of the dam itself. The 9,000-acre lake created behind Conowingo provides drinking water for Baltimore and cooling water for the Peach Bottom nuclear plant.
Planning Your Visit
The submerged Penn Central hopper sits just offshore at 39.799806, -76.288083 in the Susquehanna River next to Susquehannock State Park. The nearest public boat launch is Muddy Creek Access in York County at 534 Johnson Rd, Delta, PA 17314.
Always wear a life jacket, approach with caution, and avoid standing on the structure. Seasonal water levels and weather conditions can dramatically affect visibility, so plan your outing carefully. Respect the river, stay safe, and enjoy one of the most unusual industrial relics hidden in Lancaster County’s waters.
Learn More
📖 Learn about other unique places like this when you step off the beaten path with Uncharted Lancaster: Field Guide to the Strange, Storied, and Hidden Places of Lancaster County, Pennsylvania by Adam Zurn. This one-of-a-kind 239-page guidebook uncovers 56 fascinating sites, from the county’s very own fountain of youth to the oldest continuously operating short-line railroad in the western hemisphere.
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