Northern Belle 2025

But will it be tomorrow afternoon?

 

Biggest surprises to me were that some seem surprised this would happen. (I actually expected it would be the Belle stuck up Shap behind the Saphos tour if things had run to time.)
Majorly surprised NR did not already have basically a countrywide steam ban in place.
Last week at Swanage showed that you can have one of the best kept linesides (certainly not NR's strong suit) but in a strong wind sparks will fly off and set fires.
If sparks from underneath F1 cars can set fire to very short grass then it does not bode well for steam on the mainline this summer.
Forecast up until Easter appears mainly dry and warm across most of the country, which may also not bode well I am afraid for the GB.

 

Railway Herald is reporting that WCRC has announced that The Jacobite is going to be diesel hauled until further notice.

 

Indeed, and IIRC it was reported previously on one of the forum's that someone from NR got a large rap on the knuckles, if not more, from their employer for publishing log stuff on line, which is I suspect why some are somewhat cautious in seeing it mentioned, not just that its some massive cover up conspiracy...

Amusingly on some of the local Facebook pages round here there are a few locally based Northern staff who were commenting on the cancellations and steam trains and were rapidly being reminded that the cancellations were little different to a normal day...

FWIW when the NB came through on Saturday afternoon Tangmere was doing some and the diesel likewise....

 

Shap Wells and fire lighting at Nethertown

 

*Possible fire lighting as Ralph will tell you! Could have been 20+ men with disposable BBQs setting those fires you know!

 

Or women carelessly discarding cigarettes, or kids with matches . . . but very probably but not absolutely certainly a certain steam locomotive that had recently passed that way.

 

In this case no doubt... Most fires well away from people and started with passage of train

 

Just as well the wind was blowing inland or the coalman might have had a canny bill for the chalets.As for Oswalds theory,sheer stupidity!

 

My post was very much “tongue in cheek”, sorry if you took it seriously

 

And here’s me thinking that you liked a bit of of silliness

 

Accepted xx

 

I see the weed killer train has been up and down the S&C this week….Be nice for all that dead vegetation to see a steam loco (Or woman with cigarette?!)

 

Anyone know who Tangmeres crew were.Nothing from the usual "sauce".

 

A bloke with a disposable BBQ driving and a woman with a cigarette firing. Engine wasn’t to blame for the fires

 

I think a bloke called Ivor was one of them

 

Genuinely, and I hope Peter doesn’t give me a ticking off for sharing this…..

NR have now imposed red fire risk accross the country with diesel assisted steam mandatory.

They’ve also put some big mitigation in to their wording, whereby things like ashpan/Smokebox must be checked for robustness at each water stop, ashpan/Smokebox must be emptied at each service point, if the diesel fails then the train must be laid over till a new diesel can arrive to assist. Much of that is new….A couple of years back when a 37 failed at Carlisle under red risk, 46115 took the 12 coaches over the S&C alone. That wouldn’t now happen.

 

Thanks, not too surprising I guess. What are the categories these days? Ten years ago that would have been called yellow. Red would have been no steam at all. And does the country mean the whole of Great Britain?

 

Green
Yellow
Red
Double Red

And yes it’s red accross the board, north, south, east and west