One of the problems with my story telling is that I try to keep it too brief. There is more to the story.
The spur I reference above was one where we did not like to do drops...it was fairly short from derail to wheel stops, and had a considerable plunge from the mainline grade. I know you have seen that type of spur in your travels. Back in the day when there was enough work to require a local turn to do all the switching which included this business, the crew would usually drop the spot car down the mainline and send the switcher into the spur (one locomotive). Back to present day of the story, our east trains never had less than 3 engines which was too much length and weight to send into the spur. The conductor requesting the message instructing a drop was simply securing a CYA policy in the event something went wrong. After all, it was normally at his discretion as to how to spot the car, and he wanted to do it the safest way possible.
As to performing drops, we dropped five to seven empty hoppers and bulkhead flats into Acme Plaster company (Georgia Pacific) every weeknight on the QA&P switcher...it was routine to us.
