Laid off from BNSF Railway.

What BNSF Railway layoffs have meant for employees

When BNSF furloughed mechanical workers in 2024, the Transportation Trades Department relayed BNSF's word that many would get chances at work in other locations or in track maintenance, and spelled out what taking one would cost. A mechanical worker who moved to a new location, another craft or track maintenance would forfeit established seniority, in effect starting over, the federation wrote, and most of those track jobs paid $6 to $8 an hour less. Taken together, a transfer then could mean uprooting a household and taking a pay cut at once. BNSF's 2026 statement to KOLN described its offer as a limited number of transfers to relocate or be retrained. If you're offered a transfer, it's worth asking in writing which seniority roster you'd land on, what happens to your seniority date and what the new rate is before you answer.

Management and technology staff were cut too. BNSF's 2024 management reductions were made at its Fort Worth headquarters and across the system, and they came less than two weeks after Warren Buffett said the railroad's 2023 earnings fell more than expected, a timing Trains noted. The technology cuts followed in 2025 in a separate restructuring, and BNSF told FreightWaves it was already hiring for several key positions as it built up a team of software engineers. If you lost a technology job there and you'd consider going back, it's worth asking whether any of those openings fit your skills, and what the transition help BNSF mentioned actually covers.

BNSF ended 2025 with fewer employees than at the end of 2023, by the counts in its 2023 annual report and 2025 annual report, and the later filing credited part of a drop in pay and benefits costs to "increased employee productivity." BNSF has also bargained over moving train crews between jobs. The later filing records a one-time payment of about $290 million in a December 2024 agreement with the SMART-TD union that let BNSF redeploy brakepersons into conductor and engineer jobs. Most of the people in those counts were union members.

For train and engine crews, BNSF set out how a furlough worked in a 2019 furlough Q&A that a locomotive engineers' union site later posted. A furloughed employee got no pay but kept an employment relationship with BNSF and could be recalled under the collective bargaining agreement, by self-recall to a location where they held seniority with five days to report, by voluntary recall in seniority order with 15 days, or by mandatory recall with 30, the default for anyone who didn't pick. Junior employees who exhausted their contractual seniority might no longer hold a job, the Q&A said, and health and welfare benefits under the National Health & Welfare Plan ran four months past the last month of paid service, with COBRA available to buy for 18 months after that. Those were 2019 terms for one craft. If you're furloughed from another craft, it's worth asking your local chairman for the recall and coverage terms that apply to you now, and if you were covered through BNSF, our page on how COBRA works covers the election itself.

The headcounts attached to the 2024 and 2026 shop cuts came from union officials. If you've heard your own job is affected, you can ask your supervisor and your local chairman whether a written notice exists, and if you receive one, it can help to note the date it reached you.

A sourced history of BNSF Railway layoffs

• April 2026, union-reported layoffs at Lincoln's Havelock and Hobson yards

  A Lincoln union lodge told KOLN that 20 to 25 BNSF employees had been laid off or furloughed, with a sister union reporting losses at the Havelock and Hobson yards. BNSF described network-wide mechanical reductions at certain locations and limited transfers.

• June 2025, layoffs in Lincoln, Nebraska

  About two dozen BNSF workers in Lincoln were laid off, KLIN learned, carmen from the Havelock shops among them. A spokesperson said BNSF had to adapt its resources to demand and would keep reevaluating its needs there.

• May 2025, technology services restructuring

  BNSF said some Technology Services positions were being "repurposed or eliminated" as it formed a technology division relying less on contractors, and offered "career transition services." FreightWaves wrote that 140 to 175 workers were believed affected, an unattributed estimate.

• March 2024, management cuts at headquarters and across the system

  BNSF eliminated several hundred management positions, and people familiar with the matter put the cut at 8% of managers, roughly 400 jobs by Trains' math. BNSF said its 2024 outlook remained uncertain after a year of freight market headwinds.

• February 2024, mechanical furloughs across BNSF's system

  The Transportation Trades Department wrote to regulators that BNSF had announced furloughs of more than 362 mechanical positions on February 27. BNSF had said many could take jobs elsewhere; the federation was told only about 150 mechanical openings would be offered.

• May 2020, shop closures announced in Montana and Wyoming

  In a letter SMART quoted, BNSF set three Montana and Wyoming shops to close, Glendive's on July 7, and planned mechanical cuts in Nebraska, North Dakota, Kansas and Wisconsin, about 344 craft and 19 salaried positions in all.

What to do if you're laid off from BNSF Railway

• File for unemployment in the state where you worked. Benefits run from your filing date, and severance usually doesn't block you. BNSF Railway's biggest hubs: Illinois, Kansas, Montana. Somewhere else? Every state is here.
• Apply for financial and hardship assistance. Unemployment supplements income, but food benefits, health coverage and utility help are often available as well. Here's some of what BNSF Railway's hub states run: Illinois, Kansas, Montana, and every other state is here.
• Mind the health insurance window. Losing coverage opens a 60-day special enrollment period, and an ACA plan usually beats unsubsidized COBRA. Compare your options before the employer coverage lapses, and read how the COBRA clocks run if you are weighing it seriously.
• Get your real runway number. Severance plus savings divided by reality. The calculator takes five minutes.
• Know which clocks are already running. Severance review windows, COBRA election, visa grace periods, and 401(k) rollovers all run on federal deadlines that started at termination. All five deadlines are here.