Churnet Valley Railway General Discussion

That pole certainly gets some nice vantage points! As always Frank, fantastic pics.

 

Few news items that had been missed on this thread...

2019 Raffle Launch, and online donations page resurrected
https://www.churnetvalleyrailway.co.uk/news/north-staffordshire-railway-company-raffle-launch
https://www.totalgiving.co.uk/appeal/froghall-platform

Additional Event - Tanks to the Summit!
https://www.churnetvalleyrailway.co.uk/news/tanks-to-the-summit

Revamped 1940s event details released - 50% for period attire
https://www.churnetvalleyrailway.co.uk/news/get-ready-to-jive

Classic Car bookings now open
https://www.churnetvalleyrailway.co.uk/news/classic-car-weekend-2019

Please support at least one if not all of the above. Especially the Froghall appeal, I'd love to see us raise all the funds needed for this by the end of this year.

 

OAPWay were mucking about today. Some ditching work at the north end of Boltons yard where it looks suspiciously as if the canal, above the railway, has a leak.

 

Amen to that Neil, even in dry times there seems to be an unusual amount of wetness at that spot.....

 

But I thought you wanted to get back to Leak?

 

We would like to get the tracks back to LEEK but also have a drier track by having this LEAK plugged.

 

Concern from the Black Lion about their phone line which goes across the line and through lineside trees necessitated an unexpected visit to Consal today. Inspection of the telephone line and trees showed that there was a problem and it was not simply a case of felling a couple of trees - to do so would simply bring the line down. The only option was to fell sideways, away from the line using a winch. The Black Lion agreed to that with a guess at a 70/30 success. The two trees came down OK, the second bounced the phone line a bit but left it intact. Publican happy - job done.
The photo record is not complete the first shows the winch line the second after the felling with the phone line just about visible in the gap.

 

CVR Diesel Gala shots of the Class 31 in some lucky sunshine from the weekend!

 

Had a go today at the problem of small branches and twigs catching the carriages. Had the services of Roger Bennett (exNCB shunter) with a nice high work platform with barriers. There was a bit more than expected and we only managed the top half of the Ipstones branch but at least we proved it works. Sometimes we found it better to dismount and work from the ground (which was the only time I could take photos)

 

The work at Froghall to create an extra siding there is getting there. The task for this week was to move the switch lever from what will be the 6 ft to the south cess. Needed to extract the two long sleepers and put them back the other way round and then install the mechanism and make sure it worked.

 

Not something that happens everyday... https://www.stokesentinel.co.uk/news/stoke-on-trent-news/heritage-train-tracks-catch-fire-2952878

Reportedly a gas main ruptured under the railway and the gas was ignited by sparks from a passing train.

 

Bet it was an experience for the fire brigade having to catch the train with all there gear to get to it be fairly remote for access, how did they get water down there

 

Actually you do not put water on a fire involving a gas main, until the gas engineers have closed the system. It would be dangerous to do so. I expect other options were used. All heritage lines should have good arrangements planned with their local fire department. It does seem like the line was able to get organised quickly.

 

Has the fireball from the fractured pipe seriously damaged and buckled rail lines or burnt sleepers beyond reasonable usage strength so that some sleepers needs replacing?

 

I think ruptured is a bit strong, more like a leak, I imagine that the flames in the picture in the article would have been much higher with a rupture, and probably more damage to the trackbed.


The latest info I have is that the trackwork was fully replaced and full service now resumed.

 

The location was literally above the river. However as pointed out, you don't use water on a gas fire.

As stated, incident all managed along with the fire brigade and full repairs completed to the line within 48 hours. So apart from the Wednesday afternoon services being disrupted, we were back to normal for Saturday morning.

 

That gas main has been the source of problems several times over the years. Services have been cancelled in the past after leaks which have required repair and the area has smelt of gas numerous times when walking in the vicinity during lineside photography or vegetation clearance.

I've never known enough about gas systems to be able to judge if this is typical or whether this particular main has a poor record of integrity?

Sent from my HTC U Play using Tapatalk

 

Least it wasnt to serious for the railway and you were back up and running in couple of day

 

So was this the Leak service?