L&N's "Big Emma" 2-8-4's, with 69" drivers, were once clocked by a trailing dynamometer car at 92 mph on an empty hopper train. This was shortly after the Lima Emmas arrived, in 1949. A test crew was evaluating the Lima, which was added to the 2 Emmas on a s.b. mt hopper move, for return to whatever terminal, maybe Corbin. The fellow in the dyno car decided to cut in the recorder, and got " 90-92 mph ". I would suspect that the 4 passenger Emmas, all Baldwins, prob got the "Flamingo" goin that fast, too, during WWII, when they ran Cincy - Corbin. A retired NKP hogger once told me the fastest he had seen aboard a 700 in regular freight service was 76 mph, tho I would bet some of them got going even faster occasionally. I believe 3-figure speeds for the N&W J's in Eastern VA are pretty well documented. TRAINS' DPM wrote late in the steam era that a ride to Norfolk would reveal that "you will be propelled at speeds such as you have never before moved on rails."
|
|
