Simon Lee

On 18/03/2024 at 14:56, Captain Cuttle said:

I am not doubting what you have said but i have been following info from various forums etc and never ever heard this mentioned before. With the continuing docking fees, i wonder why it hasnt it been sent to a US Navy yard then?

I did think the same, having looked at the  SS United States Conservancy website  www.ssusc.org  they  makes no mention of the Dockyard requirement, and having being towed to Turkey and Ukraine for asbestos removal it would appear to be at odds with what it is quoted above.

Interesting that her propellers are preserved and on public display 

 SSUSPropellers2021.pdf (squarespace.com) 

15 hours ago, 45125 said:

45s had a spell in the 70s were they where regular visitors, some of which was crew training for Hull drivers, plus route refreshes for West riding men. In the 80s the 45/1s regular visitors after 84. The summer Saturday services were mostly 45/0s. The 45/0s very early visited on freight work, but did occasionally visit. The 46s appeared in the 60s, infrequent during the 70s but the 80s till their demise brought several visits on both passenger and freight.

 

Al Taylor 

D99 Third Carabinier turned up on a car special in 1970, quite a suprise as it trundled past our house, we lived off Chants Ave. They looked big, but as 45125 says they were RA6 so within the High Levels limits.  I think for me, it was at the time second only in rarity to the Cuban "class 47s" which I saw thanks to being off school with measles !   

Sad to hear this, I first met him in the old ERG shop on London Road Dover. 

He was always friendly and happy to pass on advice and encouragement .

RIP Bob

5 hours ago, Rivercider said:

Yes, that was my understanding. A 'train' was required to update records when a wagon moved from one TOPS Responsibility Area (TRA) to another.

Each train on TOPS required three inputs, the wagon consist (AS input), power consist (A7 input), departure time (BN? input). All three computer entries are required in order to generate a consist at the 'receiving'  yard.

 

On arrival at the next yard the TOPS office responsible also makes three inputs, arrival time  (BM), work performed input - which confirms all wagons have arrived, and power work performed (TF) which confirms the loco(s) have arrived OK, 

 

cheers

Sounds like we could both go back and do it all again at the drop of a hat !!

Seem to  remember a mod being introduced that on the BM arrival line, after the arrival time you could put 6 skips in then letter D which would save the DB/TF inputs. 

When I was on  my basic TOPS course at Webb House, the instructor,  Jack Jones gave us an easy way to remember the arrival inputs -

BM - bloody marvellous the trains arrived.

TF - thank f%&k there's a loco

DB - damm and blast wagons as well.

1 hour ago, HillsideDepot said:

Returning to the ferries, classing them as a "loco" makes sense as they are moving wagons from one TOPS location to another, just like a loco. Presumably wagons moving via the ferry were allocated to a "train" to allow TOPS to correctly locate and relocate them.

Indeed the schedule was set up exactly as any land based train, the ship was consisted as the loco, the wagons as any other train and the departure also 

In the early days, of the Dover office acting as Dunkerque, we would arrive the ship in Dunkerque, then 2 hours later the wagons would have to be "interfaced off" to indicate to any enquirers that the wagon had arrived on mainland Europe. Eventually this procedure became automatic. 

1 hour ago, PerthBox said:

 

Out of interest, did BR employ local French staff for the Dunkerque office or did the clerks travel across (and lodge..?).

 

On a related note, am I right in thinking that BR had a handful of booking offices abroad and, if so, does anyone know how these were managed?

It was local French staff, there was a tie up dating back to 1927, that involved the ALA company see this link, the ferry St Eloi was shown as owned by ALA and carried that companies lettering  on the funnel, as opposed to the St Germain was a pure SNCF ship. Proir to the Eloi, the Twickenham Ferry known as "Le Twic" was the ALA ship.

https://www.doverferryphotosforums.co.uk/category/pastandpresent/ferries/sealink/ala/

Jobs in the BR ticket offices abroad would appear periodically on the Clerical vacancy sheets, possibly the most coveted posting was the New York office ! Iirc they also employed local staff as well in these offices.

1 hour ago, jamie92208 said:

I be. Ie e that all main line authorised steam Locos have allocated TOPS numbers. So where I've got a photo of the I teriorvpfvthe Flying Money Piis cab with the number in the 98xxx series painted in the eaves. 

 

Jamie

Correct, same applies to to mainline registered diesels and electrics, whos numbers begin 89xxx Scotsman being 98872, D1015 Western Champion being 89415

10 hours ago, keefer said:

Don't know if it was mentioned already but weren't BR-owned ships Class 99 on TOPS?

Did that include the Train Ferries mentioned above?

You're right, all the ferries that had rails on  the main deck were numbered in the 99 xxx series.

The anomaly was the Golden Arrow ship  Invicta which gained a 99 number but was. withdrawn in 1972 when TOPS had hardly started, and l9ng before the Southern Region was online.

Something that maybe of interest/use, the fact that there used to be a TOPS office at Dunkerque for the Trainferry traffic, a very small scale operation run on a 2 shift (sort of) basis the clerk would "load" import wagons onto the system and then load the sailing details onto a consist and send it to us in Dover. The sailings being shown on TOPS as a train. 

In the days when the Ventek TOPS terminals were maintained by Ventek engineers on a monthly basis the Dunkerque office was a prized day out for them.

The Dunkerque office closed around 84/85 and the worked passed to us in Dover.

2 hours ago, MarkC said:

Yes, the shipping equivalent of the aviation industry's increased security, the ISPS Code, came in at the end of 2001, shortly after the 9/11 atrocities.

 

mark

Couldnt remember the initials of the code I was thinking about when I posted earlier.

I and a few others had permits for all the Humber Ports at the time, IIRC we got a years grace then they were withdrawn.

2 hours ago, john new said:

I thought petrol tanks were the silver one’s that needed barrier wagons, the black carried the less volatile products like tar/bitumen and without need for barrier wagons. Can someone please confirm?

 

That is correct, the cars in the photo are actually of the black variety, guess you can class the contents "Petroleum Products" as opposed to petrol.

3 hours ago, JeffP said:

Is the first photo really 2000?

Was it some sort of preservation photo opportunity?

It was a dockside photo charters that were in vogue in the early 2000s  before port security was increased in the UK.

IIRC the same group organsed and event at Goole using the Pug based on the Worth Valley.

The loco line in TOPS was / is  known as the 06 line, for the simple reason it starts 06.

The original 06 line was "split" in the first field to cater for non renumbered locos, thus imputs by the TOPS clerk would be for example as follows 

06 D 1000

06 ; 47101 the skip character replaced the D

once the 4 digit locos were withdrawn the field was amended/updated removing the need for the skip during one of the regular Saturday night update outages. One regular feature was the updates/amendments to the system were promogulated by a "ZZ" all terminals message on the previous Thursday.

There is, in, one of the late Adrian Curtis's books a photo of a TOPS printout featuring a Western a former colleague on the DOver office, had dealt with Westerns during his time at Hither Green TOPS. 

On 29/10/2023 at 20:51, Market65 said:

Good evening, everyone. Firstly, many thanks, Mick, for that excellent photo’ of the early Saxby & Farmer "Signal Stage". 

 

 This evening, with thanks to knoxrj, on Flickr, we watch an unidentified class 37, taken from the Anlaby Road flyover, Hull, in July, 1965. From the headcode the train must be an empty coaching stock movement.
 

Best regards,

 

Rob.

3N52 was ECS 1350 Filey Holiday Camp -  Hull 1525, which was booked to run round in Dairycoates 7 section. Stock had arrived at FHC as the 0820 Kings Cross - FHC.  

A quick Google search finds this on Flickr

Just checked my RCTS books from 1974 - 1980 and the Mallaband and Bowles predecessor from 1972.

34778 does not appear in any of them, so unlikely it made it into the 70s let alone the 80s.

2 hours ago, aictosphotos said:

That doesn't help at all I'm sorry as it's the Kings Cross Freight Terminal to Calvert CTRL spoil trains I'm interested in.

Might help to change the title of you post, to CTRL spoil project was different to the undersea Channel Tunnel spoil removal project. 

Fairly early example of a container ship fire Evergreens Ever Level 80/24808 in Blhom and Voss drydock Hamburg December 83

She was in collision in the Elbe with a Brazillian cargo ship and a resulting fire started in a contanier of fireworks.

IIRC this sparked a discussion on the carriage of DGs in containers and lead to the formation of the "North Sea Disaster Group" or similar name ?

Closed earlier this year, partly due to the effect of closure during lock down plus a few other factors all contributed to finish the shop off.

The stock has been aquired by  Mrs Lofthouses Emporium in Scarboro

Mrs Lofthouse's Emporium – Browse,enjoy, eclectic 

www.mrslofthouse.co.uk 

As an aside this place is worth a browse not just for railway books.

3 hours ago, MarkC said:

Agreed 100% - but as I said, it's a hell of a long way from the open deck to the water, and I suspect that realistically it's beyond the design limits for the lifejackets.

 

Mark

Chatting to a friend in the Netherlands today who is a former Rotterdam pilot,  he estimates 30 meters, approx 100 feet from deck to sea level.  Not a jump l would want to make.

Regarding the "Herald", l worked at Dover during the 80s and 90s on the train ferry berth. Around 1989 we employed a lad who was a regular bosun on the Herald, that fateful day he had taken the day off, as his wife had qualified as a midwife and it was the presentation event that night. For a longtime after he suffered bouts of guilt, knowing he should have been on duty and responsable for the doors on that sailing.

25 minutes ago, MidlandRed said:

It may be my imagination, but this looks very much like a Black 5, rather than a Patriot (45528) to me?? 

Would agree that its.a Black 5.

Patriot 45528 had smoke deflectors and a double chimney.

40 minutes ago, russ p said:

Has the footbridge been saved for use elsewhere Rob?

Its being rebuilt/restored to original "open" form, the roof being a later addition.

https://www.networkrailmediacentre.co.uk/news/refurbishment-begins-on-130-year-old-beverley-footbridge

June 1989 the last Edmonson ticket was sold, iirc it was one of the stations on the Gospel Oak - Barking line that sold the last one.

4 hours ago, Tim Chambers said:

Funny old world-I was diagnosed with an enlarged prostate  several years ago but examination and tests revealed nothing suspicious. Because of this (and several friends / relations being diagnosed with Prostate cancer) I have several times asked our local surgery for a routine "check up" PSA test and the reply has always been a refusal-no symptoms, no test. Is this normal NHS policy?

Best wishes to all, Tim.

(interesting-my last GP told me that the vast majority of men die with Prostate Cancer-note, "with" not "of".

According to the NHS website you should be allowed one if your over 50

https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/prostate-cancer/

Further out we passed Freesia Seaways inbound Goteborg to Immingham. In the background can be seen Spurn lighthouse. The point has now, finally, won over the RNLI due to safety considerations, the Humber lifeboat has now relocated to Grimsby. 

Finally in the last of the light and a stiffening wind is shuttle tanker Torill Knutsen discharging to Tetney Monobouy