Your greatest ever steam locomotive spectacle

I would add to that that watching a GMAM reaching the summit of the Lootsberg Pass in SA on the twice weekly passenger train was also pretty impressive. Whilst waiting on the horseshoe curve it was the only time in my life I could hear no sound at all for several minutes.

Total silence.

A silence broken by the sound of the Garratt slogging up the steep grades. A sound that reached an absolute crescendo as it passed by. April 1979.

Here you go. My "wider" shots were on slide and are way down the queue for scanning. But here's a B&W I took of the Garratt slogging round the horsehoe curve near the summit. 11 coach train that day.

 

A few things that stand out in my memory...

Leander climbing the Lickey unassisted, March 2006. The noise!

Clan Line hurrying south from Sheffield to Brum and Didcot on her last trip before overhaul. Very fast run!

Three days on the JingPeng pass in Nov 2004, including a cab ride after dark. Snow and bright sunlight; breathtaking bridges and embankments; double-headed QJs on 2000 tonne goods trains. Not a week too soon - a new consignment of diesels the following weekend meant most trains thereafter were either steam + diesel or 2 x diesel.

Boscarne Junction just after dawn with 2 Beattie well tanks and a selection of "clay hoods" and vans. Thanks Sidmouth!

Two Black Fives leaving Girvan, April this year. See this on YouTube.

Ask me another day, I'll probably give a different answer!

 

For me there are a few.

Seeing 4472 Flying Scotsman fly through Slough while waiting for a trip to Newton Abbot in 2000. The first time I ever saw 4472 in the flesh and something I'll never forget. (As well as seeing it take water at Newbury Racecourse,then arriving in Newton Abbot and finally up close in the station. I still have the photo of me next to it. I was only about 8 years old)

5029 and 60019 on the Mayflower back in September. We just flattened them and nearly set a preservation record (I think it might have been time from Plymouth to Exeter) but signals stopped us outside Exeter.

The Bluebell's 50th Anniversay Cavalcade. All those whistles. Something else I'll never forget

71000 on a Cumbrian Mountain Express in 2006 from York to Carlisle. We had a storming run and flew through Keighley as they had their Autumn Gala.

 

Double Headed Ivatt tanks up the Mid Hants

A Rather Splendid Unrebuilt Bulleid on a Well Known Preserved railway making up time...

Swanage Cavalcade 2009 i was on the footplate on 80078 the last time

Swanage Cavalcade 2010 Manor Lots of noise

 

A sound thats gone forever .The british Garratts climbing up towards Oakley in Bedfordshire with a full load of coal wagons

 

That's going back a bit! A real blast from the past. Only ever saw one of those LM Garratts, amd that was at Crewe Works after withdrawal.

 

i go back a bit to but they were something to behold and to me nothing to match them in this old england .Wish we still had one

 

1. Llangollen SSS2 Cavalcade under a rainbow

2. Tornado slipping out of Highley at dusk, and roaring through Bewdley Tunnel on the footplate - SVR

3. Machynllth - Tywyn behind 44871

Lewis

 

Passing Carnforth at 80mph with 46229 heading for the hills and a crowd in the yard watching us pass including a blast on the whistle from the 8F, also passing p Warrington BQ at 80mph with Hamilton and barely dropping speed up to Acton Grange, any Hamilton moments were magical.
Early Fort William-Edinburghs, when it was so new was like a dream come true, ponding up to Glen Douglas in the dark with the sound echoing of the rocks.
First steam from Inverness up to Slochd, 44871 was not the strongest Mickey but hearing the cheers from the lineside as she blasted over the summit was rather special.

 

A J94 blasting up Hopton incline on the Cromford & High Peak in 1960-something. Every laboured exhaust beat was like gunfire, and made more dramatic by the loco only appearing at the very top of the incline out of thick Derbyshire mist!

I guess a sound that might still be experienced at Foxfield.

 

ok what about most serene moment you've ever spent with a loco. just at one with the engine. i was doing a night duty at the LNEW 1 gala at barrow hill in 2007 and in the early hours fell asleep on the k4. Barrow hill is a great place as i imagine a lot of sheds are for those quiet moments when everything is shutting down for the day and its just you and the loco. many a time i've just sat on an engine and taken it all in. A full roundhouse late at night with just you with engines for company just cant be beaten.

 

MY Greatest ever steam loco spectacle? ive got 2, the first was on 73096 taking 8 up the alps when we had to make up time because we were following britianias main line special and needed to try to keep the timetable from slipping too much , i didnt see much though because i was on the shovel, but we flew up , and the second was standing at hook station in the dark and seing and hearing a bullied pacific doing what it was designed to do running flat out whisle blasting on the fast through road on the first after dark run from waterloo to eastliegh

 

Summer 1961, north end of Crewe station. We saw a Princess Royal, on the line from the north, draw up slowly to the signals in the distance and stop. It waited for some movement on/off the North Wales line. Eventually she moved off. Lots of steam and effort and she took some time to reach the station. The noise was terrific, even at a (in those days) busy Crewe station. As she approached we saw she was a green one, 46205 Princess Victoria. As she reached us, we saw that she was pulling a troop train. (Does anyone remember those?) The carriages were loaded to the gunnels, soldiers standing everywhere, compartments, corridors and probably vestibules. I have never seen a train so full of people before or since. But, this train was 24 carriages long! That Prinny must have been pulling some weight! It took a long time to get through the centre road. Goodness knows where it was going, but I bet that poor fireman had some work on that day! I'll never forget the sight.

 

Ah yes, I remember that night. I was on the footbridge at Fleet. A great moment...

 

Apart from days in early 1967, "trainspotting" at Basingstoke, and seeing (mainly)rebuilt Bulleids storming through at great speeds, the early days of Bodmin hauling the Cathedrals Express, when it went back to Alton, empty with the stock and a class 33 on the back, flying down the SW main line, remember well seeing her one week at Hersham going well, and the next week absolutely storming through Esher, red hot coals tumbling out of the chimney, safety valves lifted at speed as it passed the station, my son was able to witness some of the magic I'd enjoyed all those years before.......34016 was a goer!

 

Easy! 4th June 2010 2807 moves under its own steam in preservation for the first time! Or am I just a little biased!

 

That was a very memorable night for SR enthusiasts. I think the whistle was used rather a lot! Went to Farnborough station with my Dad for my first ML steam at night experience. One of the greatest shows on earth.

 

'Royal Scot' thundering through Longsight with a down 'Comet' during the summer of 1953 or 54.

Regards

 

1980, the Vic Falls to Bulawayo mail 18 on, leaving Dett 01:00 up the 70 mile straight, clear night, full moon, timing the klick posts from the footplate on a knackered GMAM at the unbelievable speed of 100kmph, (GMAMs only have four foot six inch drivers!) the roar from the chimney as the front power unit slips violently, Garratt boy asleep in the corner, Driver Jack Stephens eases the regulator before resuming full regulator at 35%.

As an indication of the unsuitability of this machine to do this kind of speed, at full regulator, full boiler pressure of 200psi the steam chests only showed 65psi, now that's what I call wire drawing!

Link to poor shot of GMAM on the curve at Wankie http://railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=141169&nseq=38

Alan

 

The first day in service. fantastic.....