Beira-Machipanda Derailment

[John Ashworth]

Beira-Machipanda Derailment

The Mozambican Ports and Railways Company has communicated that a derailment took place on the 22 May, 8:30am, in the Beira-Machipanda direction. Sadly at the time of the communication four were confirmed dead, six injured and six unaccounted...

[Mel Turner]

I don't think that Railways Africa actually subscribe to any of the recognized wire services, like Bloomberg, AAP, or Reuters.

They seem to surf the net and regurgitate what they discover, flogging it off as "news" 10 days or so later.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=guG9U8s7jMk
https://clubofmozambique.com/news/beira ... ling-four/

The accident occurred on Wednesday the 19th, Railways Africa published it as news on the 31st!

Video was posted to YouTube on the 22nd.

The video poses the question of why CFM persist in using their C30ACi (117 tonnes - a lightweight version of the 43 Class) over this line. Why didn't Railways Africa raise this question, or don't they employ inquiring journalists? IRCON (the Indian parastatal) was run out of Mozambique for sloppy workmanship, including the Beira-Machipanda line rebuild, in December 2011. At best it is 18TAL, but more realistically based on the number of derailments, possibly should be rated at 16 TAL. NRZ appear to only work <96 tonne locos east of the border.

[John Ashworth]

Thanks, Mel. It looks to me as if 90% of Railways Africa these days is more corporate promotion than railway news and analysis!