Main Line steam activity this evening...

So I'm out in my garden lopping the pear and apple trees after tea, and around 7.15 I heard a chime whistle twice, followed by a Stanier hooter whistle coming through Sowerby Bridge.
The locomotives weren't being worked hard considering they were travelling eastbound, so I wondered what they were? Was it Britannia and Galatea or Scots Guardsman? Or was it Sir Nigel Gresley on its way to Crewe behind a Stanier loco? There was no audible exhaust beat to listen to, sadly (usually I can hear a special right from Elland Tunnel, through Sowerby Bridge, and right up the Calder alley to Todmorden on a still evening.)

If it was 60007, would it have been able to sound its whistle?

Richard.

 

60163 passed through at 18.55 heading back to Liverpool from York.

No. 7 will be going by road to Crewe shortly, though it needs to be tripped across to the carriage works for the road access there.

 

Hmm, wonder what the Stanier whistle was then? It must have been with Tornado.

Richard.

 

Any traction engines out to greet Tornado yesterday? I recall something similar happening on the North Wales Coast one evening - a showman's engine in light steam on a low-loader parked in a lay-by beside the railway, exchanging whistles with, I think, Lizzie.