My other site has all the Tornado photos, but I have included 2 of them here. There are many photos of the Chiltern training runs, especially the one from Stourbridge – seen at Old Hill & Moor Street as well as Leamington.
This is the train from Stourbridge, hauled by 67014
I’d heard there was another training run from Stourbridge today & managed to get back from Bridgnorth just in time to see it. Only had to wait about 4 minutes for it to appear, probably checked by signals as the preceding DMU would have stopped at Rowley Regis. Typically dull weather round the “Dark Side”! As is usual with Old Hill, the spare path almost always coincides with a train running in the opposite direction – a real nightmare, as the photo shows.
I had hoped to see the 9F at Bewdley today, but it had already passed through before I arrived, so I caught the next train to Bridgnorth to see it. 46443 was on Footplate Experience and 7812 was working the other service train.
92212 will be running during the summer months, returning to the Mid Hants Railway in September.
As mentioned in the previous update, one of the new London Midland Class 172 units was running to Leamington Spa on training runs. I had previously only seen this unit stabled at Tyseley along with 172332 and wasn’t expecting to see it running. As yet there are no seats fitted. Also seen are a variety of other units at Leamington.
172331 is seen at Leamington
This train was running via Leamington, so it seemed like a good excuse for a few hours out! Chiltern Trains now have some loco-hauled sets running to/from Birmingham Moor Street and a training run from Stourbridge was also expected, so more locos to see, plus the usual freight trains. On the way there I changed trains at Solihull, and was surprised to see one of the new Class 172 DMUs pass through – the photo of that appears in another album (next update)
47804 was hauling the train (47826 at rear)
