The Great Goodbye event at Locomotion: The National Railway Museum at Shildon is proving to be a resounding success as thousands of train enthusiasts come to Shildon. The Great Goodbye is the largest event hosted at Locomotion to date, a great prelude as the museum moves into its 10th anniversary year in 2014.
Locomotive legend Mallard raced into history on 3rd July 1938 when it broke the world steam speed record. On that day, the mighty blue Mallard was recorded as reaching the awe-inspiring speed of 126mph.
The A4 class locomotive is joined by its five surviving Gresley A4 Pacific engines: Bittern, Dwight D Eisenhower, Sir Nigel Gresley, Dominion of Canada and Union of South Africa. The final reunion marks the 75th anniversary of Britain’s unsurpassed world steam speed record.
The museum on average attracts 200,000 visitors a year, however staff at Locomotion expected to attract approximately 72 thousand visitors during these nine days of the event. Staff at the museum were stunned to see 11,000 eager visitors on the first day of the event alone (Saturday 15th) and approximately 15,000 the following day, with queues of traffic filed all the way to Redworth!
Anthony Coulls, senior curator of railway vehicles at Locomotion, said, “We expected lots of people, but it has been fantastic. This has blown us away. People from across the world, and even the floodhit South-West, have travelled here”.
Stuart Bird, a Locomotion volunteer and Shildon Town Councillor, said, “The atmosphere has been amazing. “This will certainly put Shildon back on the map”.
Shildon & District's local community newspaper.
