Given n orthogonal line segments on the plane, their intersection graph is defined such that each vertex corresponds to a segment, and each edge corresponds to a pair of intersecting segments. Although this graph can have Θ(n2) edges, we show that breadth first search can be accomplished in O(nlogn) time and O(n) space. As an application, we show that the minimum link rectilinear path between two points s and t amidst rectilinear polygonal obstacles can be computed in O(nlogn) time and O(n) space, which is optimal. We mention other related results in the paper.