RTC Slough-Shrewsbury with 60009 - now 44871: 23/11/19

anyone know the reason for the delay

 

From an unpromising start, I felt this turned out to be a bit of an epic trip. Diesel assistance was sensible rather than incessant, and 44871 could be heard from coach H for every departure on the return. Talking to the stewards, the delay was caused by shunting issues at Crewe.

 

At Bristol Parkway last night I expected the 47 to be pushing very hard especially as the train was late. As it turned out 44871 was working well with just a steady shove from the rear.
As the train disappeared into the distance the sound of the '5' was especially loud and could be heard all the way to Coalpit Heath.

Despite the weather this appears to have been a very good tour. Well done to all concerned. <BJ>

 

My video from Abergavenny

 

Lovely footage that..the excitement from the kids was priceless....even heard a Welsh accent among them...fabulous...

 

Yes about 400 miles of steam haulage (with some 47 shoving of course) but the best bit was gone midnight when the black 5 took the empty stock from Slough to Southall and could still be heard long after the train disappeared !!

 

I think that's unnecessarily modest. That's a nicely composed shot that puts the train in context very nicely.

 

All a bit poor quality, and apologies for the lousy mobile phone shot at the end, but I could already hear the chuffin' as I opened the door to get out of the car so didn't have time to get the decent camera out of the boot! Even so, you get the idea with the audio. The diesel may have been giving a good shove out of Shrewsbury, but the 5 on the front was pullin' flippin' hard as well!

 

I make it 418 mile 50 chains for the tour proper. Add to that another 84 mile 20 chains for the four ECS moves which gives a total with a train of 502 miles 70 chains.
There was also some LE movements at Crewe which may have meant the loco probably did around 505 miles. That would put it for example only 16 mile short of Fort William from Euston, and impressive days work. Great credit to Ian Riley and his team.
Not sure in preservation how many tours will have had incurred over 500 miles including ECS moves, but I suspect there are those on here who will be able to tell us quite quickly.
Most people appeared to enjoy their day from what I could tell and the comments as they detrained. It was a shame that the Crewe problems caused so many Ludlow passengers to get wet as I understand the the rain did not start until around the time the tour was originally due to pick them up.
Certainly my favourite Black 5 (or the Swanage Black 5 as I refer to it after last Autumn) sounded great all day, and even on the way back could be heard well from the buffet which was 9 coaches back.

 

My video of both 44871 and 60163, taken at Abergavenny:




And a few photos here:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/hemerdon/

 

A shot from the Leominster water stop. And one during the lengthy turning and servicing move against the Platform 11 wall at Crewe, which could almost be an image from the early 1960's (apart from the high intensity lamp and the cleanliness of the loco) .

 

https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=422465911754334

A glimpse into the past for a look at what could have been, had No.9 made it onto Saturday's run.

 

Hmmm, quite a challenge to find any one-day main line rail-tour that has delivered more than 500 steam miles as the sum of tour itinerary plus ECS moves. A logical place to start looking would probably be Tornado’s mainline rail-tour history, and this would show a number of runs that significantly exceeded the 44871 plus Duff support tour mileage (418m 50c), but that still fell some way short of the 500 miles plus overall total because these Tornado outings featured a much shorter ECS mileage component to the day.

For example Steam Dreams Cathex 12.05.2012 Paddington-Shrewsbury via the Marches route : 453.3 rail-tour miles plus around 19 miles of ECS moves to and from Southall Yard with Tornado attached – some way short of that 500 mile total. Or the 16.09.2017 Border Raider ex-Tame Bridge Parkway which, by dint of an extended return mileage via Wakefield Kirkgate (when the intended Clitheroe line routing was not available), delivered a total tour mileage for the day of 456.7 miles; but again, I think the ECS mileage for the day amounted only to the distance between Bescot Yard and Tame Bridge Parkway – a return mileage of about two miles or so in total.

So one more try with this, but I would have to ask for help with discovering the “Tornado plus ECS” bit of the day’s mileage. The 15.06.2019 Yorkshire Pullman offered a full "steam-mileage-both-ways" proposition with Tornado from KGX to Scarborough, which in itself would have delivered a total mileage of 460.9 miles. In the event, the return leg was diverted (for reasons I don't recall) via Turners Lane Junction (east of Wakefield) to Hare Park Junction on the Leeds-Wakefield-Doncaster line, adding some 13.5 miles to what would have been the York –Doncaster direct mileage. 474.4 miles is still some way below the 500 mile benchmark, but I have no idea how far Tornado would have travelled with its full rake of Pullmans to get to and from The Cross.

And that’s about the best I can come up with. These were all massively impressive runs in terms of rail-tour miles, trailing loads (all were Load 13, and thus over 500 tons gross) and all were unassisted. They must have presented a significant challenge to the stamina of both locomotive and crews. But as far as the distance criterion alone is concerned, greater than Saturdays overall mileage with 44871?? – nope, it seems not!!

 

Scottish Lowlander, or does that not count as it was three locos?

 

Doesn't count for the reason you cite.

 

Definitely correct with 60163 from what I remember this was an extremely long day. 30/06/12 Kings Cross to Durham. ECS from Southall and to Tyne Yard.

http://www.sixbellsjunction.co.uk/10s/120630sd.htm

Andrew

 

Can't imagine there have ever been too many locos with a 65J shed plate that have visited Shrewsbury but to then be followed by one from 51A must be virtually unique!

 

Indeed it was, and all the better for it. Still think it will be tough to better it in terms of locomotive selection and route variety. Still, 44871's stout effort on Saturday is one for the books.