L
lester perry
I had an uncle who fired on the C&0 during steam era then became an engineer in beginning of diesel. when he passed away he was still an engineer but for CSX working in the Huntington shops. I asked him this same question. he told me how he used to do this years ago when making local run out of PeachCreek yard into Logan WV. he called it dropping or spotting on the fly if I remember correctly. he would uncouple car to be spotted from trailing cars then pull car to be spotted toward the switch. when speed became enough and they were close enough to the switch, a brakeman would I believe he called it pulled the pin. Un coupled the car to be spotted he,( my uncle the engineer) would excellerate the Loco running off and leaving the car to be spotted still rolling along. after loco goes through switch it would be thrown to direct car to business needing it. The brakeman riding the car(who pulled the pin earlier )would manually apply brakes to stop the car where needed. while he is stopping car the engine is stopped and reversed to go back ang hook up to remaining train to move on. I don't believe this could be duplicated in the modeling world