Great Western Coffee Shop

Last night Tornado became the first steam loco to reach 100 mph since the end of Southern steam fifty years ago.
The special left Newcastle around 0240 and reached 100 mph north of York

My reaction when I heard this on the radio this morning was "what's the point?". Bittern was allowed to do 90mph to mark the anniversary of fellow A4 Mallard's world steam speed record, but as far as I know there's no occasion to mark this time so why has Tornado been allowed to exceed the general 75mph restriction for mainline steam?

Possibly to allow authorisation of 90 mph running, the 100mph being the 10% overrun

ICBW but I *think* it is in connection with allowing Tornado to run at up to 90mph on future trains. This will give them more flexibility on pathing on main lines as it will be better able to keep out of the way of other services. I'm presuming that this run was to demonstrate a 10% overspeed capability in line with other new trains.

Edit: Pipped by bradshaw  :D

Reports on the BBC website certainly implied that was a test intended to facilitate regular mainline running at 90 MPH.

Splendid ! ;D I hope that we will see charters hauled by Tornado at 90 MPH.

On the West Somerset to Minehead, for example?  ;) :D ;D





That was a joke, by the way: member 'broadgage' is very familiar with Minehead and the West Somerset Railway.  :-X

Yes, 100MPH would be a bit much ON the WSR, but a rail tour or charter that reached 90 en-route to the preserved line could be attractive.

On 31st May, I'll be signalling Tornado at the Bodmin & Wenford.  I hope it'll be going a <tad> slower than that when Handing over the token, at the end of the Bodmin General platform...
(It's a bay platform, and the line speed for token handover is 5mph!)

With many thanks to you for posting that, rower40 ... but you do know that 31 May 2017 is a Wednesday, don't you?

See https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_axHV2wx8RA  :o ::) ;D

Without even clicking the link I know it's Jethro...

Programme on BBC 1 local Northeast and Yorkshire tonight at 19:30 (Sky 955-957) about Tornados 100mph run

The programe is now up on BBC IPlayer link below its well worth a watch
http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b08rb16k/tornado-the-100mph-steam-engine.

I concur: it's half an hour of your life that is actually well worth spending in watching such a thrilling historic event.  ;)