Norfolk Southern announced Friday that Timothy J. Drake, vice president engineering, will retire Oct. 31 and will be succeeded by Michael J. Wheeler, formerly vice president transportation. Succeeding Wheeler will be Terry N. Evans, formerly vice president process engineering.
Norfolk Southern Tuesday afternoon reported net income of $402 million, or $1.24 per diluted share, down 27% compared with $554 million, or $1.59 per diluted share, in the third quarter of 2011. But earnings per share surpassed by one penny Wall Street consensus analysts’ latest target of $1.23 per share.
Norfolk Southern CEO Wick Moorman and Alabama Gov. Robert Bentley joined federal, state, and local officials and business leaders Wednesday in McCalla, Ala., to mark the opening of the Birmingham Regional Intermodal Facility.
A $20 million upgrade to the Horseheads (N.Y.) Sand & Transloading Terminal (HOST) will give Norfolk Southern trains hauling sand used in extracting natural gas from the Marcellus Shale formation the ability to unload 100 freight cars within 48 hours, five times faster than they presently do.
Norfolk Southern announced late Wednesday that third-quarter 2012 earnings are expected to be in the range of $1.18 to $1.25 per diluted share, “primarily due to volume declines in certain markets and lower revenues from fuel surcharges.”
Norfolk Southern Corp. said Wednesday it “has achieved its best-ever score in the S&P 500 Climate Change Report released by the Carbon Disclosure Project.”
Norfolk Southern’s 30th Anniversary Year was helped along by a blow-out Annual Short Line meeting in Roanoke, Va. More than 200 members of the short line community attended, representing most of the 250 short lines that have direct connections with NS, along with another 140 NS names, including President and CEO Wick Moorman, Chief Operating Officer Mark Manion, and Chief Commercial Officer Don Seale. And I came away feeling a change in the air.
Norfolk Southern has always sought to broaden the experience of its senior management team. In keeping with that philosophy, John P. Rathbone was named executive vice president finance and chief financial officer, and James A. Squires was named executive vice president administration.
For this year’s second quarter, Norfolk Southern earned a net income of $524 million that edged 6% below that for the second quarter of 2011, but it also had an impressive string of records to report Tuesday.
