The death of Ty42-59, Wolsztyn, 19 March, 2000
Rarely does a web site make me sad and mad at the same time. This encyclopaedic photo gallery with photos by Jacek Raczkowski, Pawel Korcz, Tomislaw Czarnecki, and Artur Szymanski shows some of the steam engines that were scrapped at the very end of the 1990s and well into the 21 century in various locations in Poland. Particularly ironic is this Ty42 being cut up at Wolsztyn. It seems that every time they have a steam parade there, the local PKP Cargo management look at any ‘spare’ steam engines and order a ‘tidy up’, “Just get out the oxy-acetylene and cut down that pile of scrap.” The result is that virtually no steam engines have survived at Wolsztyn that were actually based there in the days when steam was the basic motive power in Poland. It’s crazy that, at a time when every country in Europe is promoting its industrial heritage, some Poles can be so short sighted.
Tags: steam loco cut up, Ty42
Behind The Water Tower 
Tuesday, 18 August 2009 at 01:33 |
Here in the U.S. we did them same thing back in the late 1950s until today there are only about 1400 steam locomotives left in the whole U.S. They became expensive to maintain and parts became scarce. We still have a lot running on our excursion railroads across the united states. The Union Pacific Railroad has an excellent steam program every year.