modelrail.otenko Trains, computers, vintage, retro, model railways… the lot…

Usual suspects: DERM58

May 7th saw the Diesel Electric Rail Motor Preservation Association of Victoria Inc run another tour with their prized DERM58. This time it was out on the freight BG to Seymour with a return trip via the passenger line through Essendon. I woke up at sparrows-fart on Saturday to see it on the viaduct over the Maribyrnong river near McIntyre Loop.

The weather, as per Melbourne, was playing hard-to-get and it was bloody freezing before the sun came up. There was a lovely pink sunrise which I tried to capture before realising I'd remembered the XPT arrival times wrong... I heard it coming and just managed to get a dodgy shot.

The next train wasn't for an hour... so I entertained myself by finding a good location where I could use the tele-lens and the available sunlight. It turns out that on the high-way side there is a nice incline where you can get above track-level with a great view of the viaduct. You can also see the signals in both directions to know when something is approaching.

After being entertained by quite a few noisy birds...

...I was greeted by howling NRs on a superfreighter heading north...

The XPT was to return next... it did and it wasn't hanging around. Fortunately the sun came out to ensure I could match a shutter speed with the train's speed.

It was then about a 40minute wait for the DERM to arrive... during this time there were multiple acts of stupidity by various forms of wildlife.

And then the DERM arrived...

The next train was to be a southbound superfreighter in an hour. I decided that the weather wasn't getting any better and so started making my way back to the car. Of course, if anyone had looked in the long shots of the DERM58, you'd have seen that the southbound signal was at clear... these things are completely hard to trust, but it turns out that if you see a green in this area then you should hang around.

I'd made it half-way back to the car when I heard a very nice howl from the north... as I turned around QR came hurtling across the bridge with an awesome lashup of LDP-009 + 6005 + 6002 + LDP-008.

Supposedly it held pace all the way into Sunshine and scared a track gang working around the corner... I'm not surprised.

I headed to Kensington in the afternoon to see the DERM return via the passenger lines. There's a nice spot near the Allied Mills where you can see the lines off to the West as well.

And that was that... it was cold and wet and any further chasing would have been futile. I'm still learning the correct approach with photographing under low light conditions, but am pretty happy with how the above shots came out.