Fifty years later, steam appears on British railway
PrintNo. 60163 Tornado completes trial run
Posted in Odds and Sods, 6th November 2008 00:02 GMT
Free whitepaper – Total cost of ownership of Dell, HP and IBM blade solutions
A Peppercorn class A1 Pacific traveled from York to Scarborough on Tuesday evening, becoming the first new steam train to run on Britain's railway since 1960.
The steam locomotive - No. 60163 Tornado - departed the National Railway Museum in York at 6:04pm, arrived at York station by 6:18, and reached the coast at 8:12, The Telegraph reports. At 10:15pm, it left Scarborough, returning to its home at the museum just before midnight.
Built by the A1 Steam Locomotive Trust, Tornado is the first Peppercorn class A1 steam locomotive in existence since the last original A1 - No. 60145 Saint Mungow - was euthanized in 1966. The trust hopes to get the train into main line passenger service next year.
With Tuesday's trial run - a "light engine movement" - the train pulled two support coaches and nine engineers. Maximum speed: 50mph.
The Tornado will be based at the National Railway Museum (NRM) until at least February. Over the next few months, it will undergo additional main line tests, before being certified to run on Network Rail.
The next trial is scheduled for Thursday, when the train will travel to Barrow Hill, Chesterfield and return. ®
What Exchange can't do - and Dell can
Enabling the Agile Data Center
Dirty, dirty PCs: The X-rated picture guide
Top 500 supers - rise of the Linux quad-cores
Early adopters bloodied by Ubuntu's Karmic Koala
Sign up, sign up for The Register IT security newsletter