Old tech saves the day

[bellinghman]

As seen here: Passengers rescued by Tornado.

It's rather wonderful in its way that when the electric-driven trains were being disabled by ice and snow, a good old-fashioned A1 Pacific steam loco could carry the stranded passengers to London.

He said: "It was a nice way to finish for Christmas, though I think some of the rescued passengers didn't realise they'd even been travelling on a steam train until they got off."

Hmm. I wonder what they thought the plume flowing back along the train from the front was, then.

(Steam trains are wondrous things, but I wouldn't really want them back in bulk. Electrics can run in almost any weather, as the Swiss can demonstrate, and they don't have to run on hydrocarbons.)

Comments

[jon-a-five.livejournal.com]

The problem with moving a diesel train line to electric is that you have to add the electrical wiring along the track as well as buy new trains. It's incredibly expensive and would require investment (which seems to be a rude word in some parts of the train industry and government).