Buried locomotives

[Mr Brunel]

There are two incidents I'm looking at, and more info would be appreicated.

Lindal Moor

A D1, no. 115 fell into a 200ft hole caused by subsidence and was buried.

I'm trying to find the site of the accident of Google earth and co-ordinates

or similiar would be nice.

South Mimms

A Fowler 4P was being used for a POW film and an accident was staged.

It went off an embankment and was left there, somewhere under

where South Mimms Services is now. I'd like to know which film this was.

[bagnall]

Don't know the first one,the film you are looking for is The Password is Courage staring Dirk Bogart made in 1962/63.I have just Googled the name of the film and one of the sites has a trailer with said Fowler 4P fitted with smoke deflectors rolling down the bank.I have seen this film on TV a few times,their are other railway shots in it including a loco shed scene.I recall some discussion about this loco in one of the railway magazines I think Steam World.I think the consensus was that the loco was cut up.I hope this info is some help with your quest.

[Invicta]

Don't know the first one,the film you are looking for is The Password is Courage staring Dirk Bogart made in 1962/63.I have just Googled the name of the film and one of the sites has a trailer with said Fowler 4P fitted with smoke deflectors rolling down the bank.I have seen this film on TV a few times,their are other railway shots in it including a loco shed scene.I recall some discussion about this loco in one of the railway magazines I think Steam World.I think the consensus was that the loco was cut up.I hope this info is some help with your quest.

 

Definitely 'The Password is Courage'. Haven't watched it in a while, but IIRC, all of the railway sequences feature British locos and stock - According to what I've read on www.imdb.com and elsewhere, the service station in question is Scratchwood on the M1, rather than South Mimms? The Fowler 2-6-4T was 42325 apparently

[DavidBelcher]

The Furness Railway incident is a fairly well-known one, I think. Some extra detail (including more pointers re. the location) and some photos here;

 

http://lindal-in-furness.co.uk/Heritage/lindalhole.htm

 

The only other 'buried loco' tale I'm aware of apart from these two is the contractor's saddle tank loco reputedly buried beneath the old Wembley pitch after completion of the stadium in the early 1920s.

 

David

[Fat Controller]

The Furness Railway incident is a fairly well-known one, I think. Some extra detail (including more pointers re. the location) and some photos here;

 

http://lindal-in-furness.co.uk/Heritage/lindalhole.htm

 

The only other 'buried loco' tale I'm aware of apart from these two is the contractor's saddle tank loco reputedly buried beneath the old Wembley pitch after completion of the stadium in the early 1920s.

 

David

Was there not a Scottish Type 2 which ended up buried, rather than cut up, due to asbestos contamination?

[bertiedog]

The Wembley pitch loco story dates not from the Wembley Stadium, but the construction of the Wembley Tower, a failed Victorian attempt to rival the Eiffel Tower in Paris. It was used for radio experiments, and was open to the public to the first level for a while.

 

Watkin's folly was it's nickname and Watkins was a director of the Metropolitan Railway and the Great Central Railway. It had four vast concrete bases, and the rumour was that they were filled with steel reinforcing from scrap track and railway locomotives.

 

The bases were left after the tower demolition in 1907 and 1920, and incorporated into the new Empire Stadium structure, with one base left complete under the pitch......a good story unfortunately found to be wrong on the demolition for the brand new Stadium...nothing was found in the bases left apart from rail section.

 

They were removed in the current rebuild, including the pitch base, which was found to have been half removed in the 1920's....no locos there at all.

 

Stephen.

[smudgeloco]

Thanks for the link David, what an enthralling read that is.

I remember reading it in the book, Red For Danger, a great book by the way.

[APOLLO]

One at Bickershaw, near Wigan also.

 

http://www.cmhrc.co.uk/site/scrapbook/csdisasters/mine_shafts.html

 

 

Locomotive and thirteen wagons plunged down an old pit shaft

An investigation will also made regarding other derelict mine shafts in the town. The danger of these old mine shafts was pinpointed in April 1945. Then a locomotive and thirteen wagons plunged down an old pit shaft-known as the No.7 Brookside Colliery or New Zealand Pit at Bickershaw. The railway line had keen laid over this long forgotten pit shaft.

 

The locomotive and the wagons were never recovered. Neither was the body of the loco driver, Ludovic Berry. An inquest was held at which a verdict of misadventure was returned on Berry who was aged 67. Then a funeral was conducted at the top of the shaft.

 

Photo here of the hole.

 

http://www.wiganworld.co.uk/album/photo.php?id=7583

 

Apollo

 

 

 

[John_Hughes]

Not buried, but sunk in one of the British Columbia Finger Lakes is allegedly a Canadian Pacific D4 4-6-0 which rolled off a barge and straight down into the depths.

 

Still down there, apparently.....

[Pennine MC]

Was there not a Scottish Type 2 which ended up buried, rather than cut up, due to asbestos contamination?

 

You might be thinking of the railbus body from Millerhill, formerly used as a mess hut

[pete_mcfarlane]

You might be thinking of the railbus body from Millerhill, formerly used as a mess hut

Quite a lot of CIE and NIR railcars were buried in a quarry for the same reason (cheaper than removing the asbestos and then scrapping).

[Bert Cheese]

There was definitely a burial of a locomotive in the late 1980s or thereabouts at Bishopbriggs if my memory serves me correctly. Class 26 or 27 wrapped in heavy duty polythene, due to Blue Asbestos contamination, and commited to the earth. Scandalous really, bury it and hope that it is not subsequently unearthed by the unwary.

 

 

Correct, 27043 was withdrawn in April 1980 and buried in November 1985 at Patersons tip, Mount Vernon owing to asbestos contamination precluding a move to one of the more usual disposal locations.

[Chameleon]

Why did that loco specifically have such contamination that it needed disposal in that way but none of the others did?

[Trog]

Definitely 'The Password is Courage'. Haven't watched it in a while, but IIRC, all of the railway sequences feature British locos and stock - According to what I've read on www.imdb.com and elsewhere, the service station in question is Scratchwood on the M1, rather than South Mimms? The Fowler 2-6-4T was 42325 apparently

 

 

An ex collegue now retired who was one of the local signalmen at the time, once told me that the loco was buried, some where off the north end of Scratchwood services.

[Pannier Tank]

There was definitely a burial of a locomotive in the late 1980s or thereabouts at Bishopbriggs if my memory serves me correctly. Class 26 or 27 wrapped in heavy duty polythene, due to Blue Asbestos contamination, and commited to the earth. Scandalous really, bury it and hope that it is not subsequently unearthed by the unwary.

 

27 043 Paterson's Tip, Mount Vernon ?

[Jenny Emily]

Why did that loco specifically have such contamination that it needed disposal in that way but none of the others did?

 

I was wondering much the same. IIRC, it was stripped of most of the innards and bogies and was litterally an empty shell with cabs on.

 

 

On the subject of drowned locomotives, aren't there a load in the English channel that were on a ship torpedoed during one of the World Wars? I've also heard of locomotives being used in some far-flung country to reinforce embankments. I seem to recall stories of scrap locos being pulled to the locations then derailed and rolled down into adjacent rivers to bolster the banks.

[Coombe Barton]

A Sherman tanl was recovered that had been sunk on Exercise Tiger, a precursor for D-Day which had been disrupted by Genrman e-boats. http://www.shermantank.co.uk/recovery.ikml

 

Leslie Thomas dramatised this in 'The Magic Army' where he told that a loco was lost. However such that because of wartime secrecy the truth will probably never be known.

 

The wikipedia entry on Exercise Tiger http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exercise_Tiger does not mention a loco.

[298]

I was wondering much the same. IIRC, it was stripped of most of the innards and bogies and was litterally an empty shell with cabs on.

 

 

On the subject of drowned locomotives, aren't there a load in the English channel that were on a ship torpedoed during one of the World Wars? I've also heard of locomotives being used in some far-flung country to reinforce embankments. I seem to recall stories of scrap locos being pulled to the locations then derailed and rolled down into adjacent rivers to bolster the banks.

 

War Department Dean's Goods, by all accounts.

 

There was also an ex-Anglia class 86 buried under a big pile of scrap, presumably until it (and everything around it) could be processed.

[noiseboy72]

There is also a loco off the coast of Australia. It was being transported from New Zealand in the 1880s and the ship sank. Up until the 1970's it was possible to see bits of boiler and tubes sticking up above the waves. The rest of the frame has now rolled into the reef and is no longer visible.

[Fat Controller]

There is also a loco off the coast of Australia. It was being transported from New Zealand in the 1880s and the ship sank. Up until the 1970's it was possible to see bits of boiler and tubes sticking up above the waves. The rest of the frame has now rolled into the reef and is no longer visible.

There was a 19th century steam loco discovered in the Bristol Channel within the last few years.

WW2 saw a couple of recorded incidents. A number of Stanier-designed 8F 2-8-0s were lost due to enemy action in the Red Sea, whilst en-route to Persia (as it then was), whilst a number of American/Canadian built 1-4-1Rs were lost in the Atlantic- one of the French mags had an April 1st spoof with a Jouef model apparently on the sea bed, the effect being somewhat spoilt by the 1:1 scale goldfish.

[60B]

Was there not a Scottish Type 2 which ended up buried, rather than cut up, due to asbestos contamination?

 

Haven't heard of that one. There is a railbus (the one at craigentinny that was a mess room) buried in the yard in Boat of Garten.

[Invicta]

.

WW2 saw a couple of recorded incidents. A number of Stanier-designed 8F 2-8-0s were lost due to enemy action in the Red Sea, whilst en-route to Persia (as it then was).

 

That's the 'SS Thistlegorm', sunk after being bombed by Luftwaffe Heinkels in the Red Sea in October 1941- she had 2 8Fs (and some railway wagons) as deck cargo, as well as Bedford trucks, Bren carriers, aircraft parts etc in the holds.

 

8F

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2749/4209414132_45306e8e04.jpg

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3538/3338161103_16246b7479.jpg?v=0

http://www.dive-club.com/images/image26.jpg

 

 

8F Tender

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3265/3139155812_03895b48c6.jpg

 

tanker wagon

http://www.mysterra.org/webmag/photos/articles/thistlegorm-2.JPG

 

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SS_Thistlegorm

 

More pics

http://www.mysterra.org/picture-library/browse.php?nb_img=12&category=68&AttrOne=&AttrTwo=&offset=0&search=thistlegorm&orderby=&SearchAll=1

[jamie92208]

Railway Magazine have run 2 articles in the last year about locos lost at sea and now have a failry definitive list published. The 2nd update part was only a couple of months ago. Also I have come across a reference to an old locomotive being mounted on the deck of HMS Centurion in 1944. This was a WW1 battleship that had been a training hulk at I think Plymouth and was towed over to Normandy and sunk as part of the breakwater for the Mulberry harbour at Arromanches. They needed steam to power auxiliaries such as the rudder when it was on tow and the various naval reference book that I have got state that the dockyard mounted an old railway locomotive somewhere on the rear deck. The wreck has mainly been cut up where it lies because of the valuable pre 1940 armour plate. Has anyone out there got a clue as to which loco was used.

 

Jamie

[Andy Kirkham]

It says in one of JIC Boyd's books that in comparatively modern times (sixties or seventies) a battery locomotive working underground at Aberllefenni slate quarry ran away and plunged over a subterranean precipice to be lost forever. No great loss, you might say, except that it was constructed on the chassis of a steam loco that had worked in one of the Blaenau Ffestiniog quaries. I'm afraid my books are in store so I can't check the exact details.

[Stormbringer]

While we're on the subject of buried/sunken loco's a few years back I was told of one that is at the bottom of Stonar lake just outside Sandwich in Kent. Last year I asked the skipper of the local river tours boat if this was true. He said it was a loco that was sunk in the lake to give a training facility for divers during wartime.

 

Does anyone have any idea what loco it was?

 

TIA

Pete