Instead of filming for the Blaenavon Railway steam gala weekend like we used to do, we decided to attend the Autumn Diesel Gala weekend at the Dean Forest Railway, which was held on both Saturday 14th September and Sunday 15th September, 2024. With sunshine, clouds and the sound of first generation diesels echoing through the trees, this year's visit to the gala was very enjoyable, although the event had been 'cursed' in a manner of speaking.
In the days leading up to the event, the diesel gala was plagued by unexpected problems to about half of the planned running diesel locos, no doubt brought upon by the infamous 'Friday the 13th'.
Europhoenix 37510 'Orion' experienced engine start up issues while her classmate, 37884 'Cepheus' ran faultlessly. While 37510 was able to run in the late afternoon of the Saturday, which we didn't get to see, she completely broke down on the Sunday, and was stabled at Lydney Junction for the rest of the weekend.
South Devon Railway's Class 25 guest loco, 25262, suffered an electrical fault issue at the literal last second as the crew were making preparations to load her onto a lorry carrier. As a result, she was unable to attend and the timetable had to be revised to exclude her from the gala.
Finally, Class 09 diesel shunter, 09106, was unable to run the event due to unspecified problems. There were 6 planned diesel locos to run, and about three of them ended up falling under the weather.
Despite these unfortunate setbacks, 37884, 08769 & 73003 (E6003) all ran without problems and they performed very well over the course of two days, with the Class 73 'Sir Herbert Walker' being the star performer of the event and looking absolutely stunning in the Forest of Dean amongst the trees.
While 'Friday the 13th' may have caused some curses to happen for half of the diesels, the show had to go on, and we really enjoyed our two days of the diesel gala event, having just the right weather for it too.
This is also, unfortunately, the very last time that our Sony 4K Video Camera would ever be used for filming railway videos, because a few days later after the event had passed, the camera itself somehow crashed and is now unable to be used for anymore filming. While an unfortunate setback for us, we still have our older and smaller 2015 HD Video Camera to use for filming.
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Filmed at Stations
Lydney Town
Lydney Junction
Norchard
Parkend
Whitecroft
Filmed on
Saturday 14th September, 2024
Sunday 15th September, 2024
Filmed and Produced by
Scott Coombes
Thomas Coombes
(C) 2024 S.T.C Rail Productions
24 сен 2024
