30 years ago today

Nice photos 50041. Thanks for sharing those.

 

Love the old photos without the clutter of overhead wires.

 

Here's another one from the same day - 50011 at Carlisle with a railtour (and the first class 50 to reach Carlisle since they emigrated to the Western region)

Sorry about the picture quality. It was taken using a cheapo 110 instamatic.

 

55 021 oh that beast of a English Electric Engine. Well i was a raw lad just out of school and a secondman on my beloved Peaks at St Pancras. The Deltics were coming off so i went to see what all the fuss was about (purely by accident) i was in York and saw that a rake of mark 1 / 2 A coaches in the platform with a Deltic up front. I thought i will give this a go. We left York mid afternoon i think and all was going well until we had gone about i dont know 10 miles and there in the middle of nowhere 55 021 decided she had had enough. The driver couldnt move the train and as luck was about a fitter was on board, he went to investigate, not sure what the problem was but the fitter drove the train by using the rear cab with the driver up front controlling the brake. We pulled into Selby station where she was decleared a failure. She was unceremoniously uncoupled and a duff 47 430 (strange how you remember such things when your in a crisis) was attached to take us on to London i think we departed about 70 late.

I must of looked liked a train spotter at the time as when we got to Doncaster i was bombarded with what Deltic failed. By Peterborough i had enough and bailed out and decided enough is enough.

I never had the opportunity to ride behind a Deltic again and havent even up to now. What i do say to my Deltic friends is that i had 1 journey behind a deltic and 1 failure behind a Deltic, a 100% failure rate.

I thought what was all the fuss about!

I hope i didnt bore you.

BTW Glad to see the Peak looks in better condition in the photo.