Snowploughs are readied to rescue a snowbound train - in one of the most popular of all British Transport Films. | dG1fLXVnSW9NRDQ5NUU
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Short filmTranscript
00:00 [Sounds of traffic]
00:05 There is still no break in the cold spell. Heavy snow showers in the areas around York, Middlesbrough and Darlington have affected rail traffic,
00:13 where a strong southwest wind has swept powdered snow off the surrounding hillsides into many rail cuttings, blocking them completely.
00:21 Some roads also have been made virtually impossible, and one or two villages are temporarily...
00:27 [Music]
00:48 It was about 5am on Thursday, the 24th of February, when the operating department heard that the 4.20am goods were stuck in a heavy drift in Bleak Gill.
00:57 Motive power sent in two engines and two heavy ploughs, but conditions were still bad and the ploughs got stuck too.
01:04 Then it was up to the civil engineers. A plan was agreed with the other two departments and the local inspectors briefed their men.
01:12 Men from Darlington, West Auckland, even from a quarry alongside the line.
01:19 Well, we dug the ploughs out after a struggle and started all over again. Motive power ran the ploughs up and down to get one line clear.
01:27 Then we could start thinking about the stuck train. So we embarked our men in the snow ploughs and ran them as close in to Bleak Gill as we could.
01:36 [Music]
01:52 [Engine noise]
02:20 [Train whistle]
02:22 [Music]
02:33 [Sound of train]
02:36 When you get a job of this sort, all the snow ploughs in the world can't do away with the need for good, solid, back-breaking digging.
02:44 Once one line was clear, it was handed back to the operating department.
02:49 Digging went on throughout the night by the light of the silvery moon, helped out by pressure lamps of course.
02:55 Very romantic, but it didn't make the job any more convenient or comfortable.
03:01 The thing is, to give the ploughs a reasonable chance of getting through a drift without getting stuck, we have to cut the snow up into chunks.
03:08 Like eating a landlady's cake. The more it's divided, the easier it is to get through.
03:14 [Sound of men working]
03:39 Besides, it's always a comfort to know if we've still got a line down underneath the snow.
03:44 Oh, there you are. I knew we had. Good.
03:48 [Sound of men working]
04:02 As we kept the work going in shifts, night and day, changeovers and feeding had to be organised.
04:08 No restaurants on the Stainmore summit, so the refreshment rooms at Barnard Castle found themselves clean out of sandwiches and tea.
04:16 [Sound of men working]
04:31 Driving an engine's one thing. Blinding a plough into a drift is another.
04:38 [Sound of men working]
04:54 When you get a cab full of snow and steam and smoke and spume, all you want is to stop.
05:00 But the diggers want loose snow to work on, so you just have to keep going.
05:05 [Sound of men working]
05:11 The train was reached at about 3pm on the Monday, four days after it was first stranded.
05:16 And that, you might think, was that. But it wasn't.
05:19 When it decides to stick in a drift, an engine is pretty hot and melts quite a lot of the snow that piles up over it.
05:26 But then it cools down after a bit and the whole lot gets frozen as solid as an iceberg.
05:32 So that meant more digging.
05:34 [Sound of men working]
05:40 On this sort of job, the district engineer and the operating superintendent are always popping up to see how the work's going.
05:46 They usually have a word with the chief permanent way inspector too,
05:49 to find out how much digging will have to be done before getting on to the next stage.
05:53 [Sound of engine starting]
05:57 With a 40 mile an hour wind blowing powdered snow back into your face,
06:01 you'd think the language would be enough to bring in a general for.
06:04 But language wasn't enough to thaw this engine out.
06:33 Even when the drift snow is cleared, every joint, every valve and piston is a solid block of ice.
06:38 So is the boiler by this time. But we ignore that one.
06:42 We just thaw out all the moving parts with cotton waste soaked in paraffin,
06:45 and with steam jets from the rescue engine.
06:53 It looks a bit crude. It is.
06:56 But when you are on the moortops with nothing but snow and bad language
06:59 and whatever tools you've been able to drag with you, it's the only thing to do.
07:03 And the crude equipment does the job.
07:06 Anyway, after an hour or two, the moving parts ought to be free.
07:21 It's still touch and go whether she'll move or not.
07:23 But we've brought a couple of engines with us, so we hitch her up and have a go.
07:35 (music)
07:37 (music)
07:52 (music)
08:10 Now you would think he could pack up and go home.
08:13 But there are still the wagons to get out as well.
08:15 And that means more digging.
08:35 (music)
08:49 Until at last they're all out.
08:51 Five slogging days after the train first got stuck.
08:55 But when this sort of thing happens, we get stuck into it, and then dig ourselves out.
09:03 It's amazing how much faster nature can do the job for you when it wants to.
09:08 And then the 420 goods comes back to normal again.
09:11 Until the next time anyway.
09:13 (music)
09:32 [MUSIC]