Viaduct over Olifants river - Vredendal

[Aidan McCarthy]

A few photos of the viaduct spanning the Olifants river valley on the iron ore line near Vredendal. A very impressive piece of civil engineering. Unfortunately durign the 2 hours I had not a single train came across.

[Ashley Peter]

Hi Aidan -

Geoff Bennett gave the RSSA Natal Branch an illustrated talk on the OREX line at our monthly meeting on 16 December and this bridge featured prominently. It is claimed to be the longest incrementally launched structure in the world and makes the massive iron ore trains look tiny by comparison - picture included on page 7 of Natal Newsletter.

He also showed a video clip of one the 350 truck ore trains passing a level crossing, with four sets of locomotives (combinations of 9E/34); one set leading, two sets cut into the train and a third set "banking" from the rear - all operated by remote control from the front 9E, effectively making it a "combined banked" train - just like the NGR used to do on the Natal Main Line more than 100 years ago... The train was moving at quite a pace but still took almost five minutes to pass! Patience required, obviously!

Regards


Ashley

[Aidan McCarthy]

Hi Ashley,

If you look under the electric motive power photographs there are some photos of a 350 wagon empty train between Saldanha and Elandsbaai on a visit earlier in my holiday. Also a picture to the new 15E seen in the yard at Saldanha. Did Geoff say how the locomotive sets communicate, I presume radio as I could not see any cables?

[Ashley Peter]

At one stage I believe that "smart cables" were in use but Geoff was under the impression that everything was done by radio nowadays. Would be interesting to know how this means of communication handles rugged terrain, as the coastal section has some quite serious cuttings and, I think, even tunnels... The back locos would be more than 3.5km from the driver when the train is in a straight line.