Sishen – Saldanha railway line

Port of Saldanha – Sishen
SAR Class 9E Series 1 locomotive in Salko's yard
Route length:	861 km
Gauge :	1067 mm ( cape track )
Power system :	50 kV 50 Hz  ~
Maximum slope :	10  ‰
Top speed:	80 km / h
Route
Legend Port of Saldanha 0 Salko's yard to Cape Town Cape Town – Saldanha 41 Dwarskersbos Loop 1 92 Kreefbai Loop 2 142 Bamboesbaai Loop 3 Olifant's River Cape Town - Bitterfontein from Bitterfontein 184 Knersvlak Loop 4 227 Saggiesberg Loop 5 274 Kanakies Loop 6 337 De Kop Loop 7 372 Sous Loop 8 409 Commissioner's Pan Loop 9 446 Half way Loop 10 484 Dagab Loop 11 532 Scour Loop 12 576 Kenhardt Loop 13 614 Rugseer Loop 14 659 Oorkruis Loop 15 Prieska - Upington Orange 699 Rooilyf Loop 16 741 Witpan Loop 17 792 Vrolik Loop 18 Langberg Loop 19 Postmasburg - Hotazel from Hotazel ​​and Postmasburg 861 Sishen

The Sishen – Saldanha railway line (English Sishen-Saldanha Railway Line ), also ore export line ( Ore export Line or Orex line ), is a 861 kilometer long, single-track, electrified railway line in South Africa .

The route connects iron ore mines near Sishen in the Northern Cape Province with the Atlantic port of Saldanha in the Western Cape Province . Heavy freight trains run on it ; Passenger traffic does not take place. As is customary in South Africa, it was built in Cape Gauge .

geography

From a height of 1295 meters above sea level in Sishen, the route climbs 42 kilometers before it drops to the Oranje at Groblershoop . Over the next 300 kilometers, the route rises and falls until it drops to the Atlantic coast. The route crosses the Olifant's River on a 1035 meter long viaduct between Vredendal and Lutzville, reaches the coast and follows it around 160 kilometers south to Saldanha. The route has numerous curves with large radii. Gravel roads run parallel to the route. Roads are always crossed at the same level . The only tunnel is the 840 meter long Bobbejaansberg tunnel at Elands Bay .

history

Ore port in Saldanha

With a cabinet decision of February 1973, the South African government gave its approval for an expansion of mining activities in the Sishen region. This also included the construction of a railway line and a bulk cargo port in Saldanha Bay . The legal basis for both projects was formed by the Sishen-Saldanha Bay Railway Construction Act ( Act No. 28/1973 ) and the Saldanha Bay Harbor Construction Act ( Act No. 29/1973 ). The decision to build it subsequently became a controversial issue, the public debate of which continued through 1974 and spread to other major industrial centers such as Richards Bay and Newcastle . The Straszacker Committee dealt with the investigation into the feasibility of the railway line from Sishen to Saldanha , whose report was not published. The total costs for the construction of the railway line, the port and all ancillary facilities were then put at 480 million rand .

The railway line was built from June 1, 1973 by ISCOR ( Iron and Steel Corporation ), a semi-public iron and steel company that has been mining iron ore in Sishen since 1953 and looking for an efficient connection to the nearest deep-water port for its removal . In May 1976 the route was opened; in April 1978 it was handed over to South African Railways & Harbors , today Transnet Freight Rail , which electrified the route. An operating voltage of 50 kV alternating current was chosen instead of the usual 25 kV in order to be able to transport heavier loads and to be able to increase the distances between the substations . Initially, the trains consisted of three SAR class 9E locomotives , which pulled 210 CR freight cars with a capacity of 80 tons each. Iron ore has also been shipped from Beeshoek near Postmasburg since 1978 . In 1980 the first freight train with ore concentrate drove to the port of Saldanha.

In 1989 the record run of a train consisting of nine electric locomotives, seven diesel locomotives and 660 loaded wagons took place. The train was 7,303 meters long and weighed 71,210 tons. His average speed was around 38 km / h. By 2008, 600 million tons of ore had been transported. In 2010 the third and last segment of a train derailed. 107 wagons loaded with iron ore jumped off the rails and three locomotives were destroyed. In a similar accident in the same year, an unmanned train derailed because the radio link to some of the locomotives was lost.

Originally, the single-track line was provided with ten intersections ( loops ). Since then, their number has been increased to 19 in order to increase line capacity. Loop 7 (De Kop, at kilometer 337) is to be replaced by loop 7A, which should be between kilometers 316 and 324 so that the distances between the intersections are more even.

business

SAR class 15E locomotive

Ore transport in Saldanha

The Salkor Yard depot is located in Saldanha, about five kilometers from the port. In the marshalling yard there , the trains are separated into smaller units and driven to the port. The maximum speed is 80 km / h.

The iron ore trains are driven by two people each, and there is a change in personnel in Halfweg. About 30 iron ore trains run per week. The crossing points are unoccupied except in Halfweg. Usually empty trains wait there for loaded trains.

The ore trains have been operated with Radio Distributed Power (RDP) technology since 2007 . They have a total mass of around 41,400 tons and are the longest trains in the world to transport bulk goods. At 30 tons, its axle load is the highest on Cape Gauge routes in the world. The ore trains consist of 342 wagons that are pulled by eight to twelve locomotives. Each train consists of three 114-car trains coupled together, each of which is hauled by an electric locomotive and one or two diesel locomotives. At the end of the 3.72 km long train, a single electric locomotive works. Each wagon carries a load of 100 tons, so that 34,200 tons of ore can be transported in one train. The intermediate locomotives and the push locomotive at the end of the train are operated via radio remote control, with the signals from the head of the train being transmitted to the electric locomotives that are lined up in the train, which remote control the diesel locomotives coupled to them via a cable. The pulling and braking force of each locomotive package can be operated independently of the other locomotive packages. Mainly electric locomotives of class 9E and 15E , as well as diesel locomotives of class 34D and 43D are used. Often all four series can be found on the same train. The class 15E locomotives have been in service since 2009.

In 2018, a 375-car train, which was composed of three 125-car trains, ran the route on a trial basis. The 4 km long train transported manganese ore to the port.

In addition to the iron ore trains, which carry around three-quarters of the tonnage transported on the line, there are also other shorter trains that transport zinc ore concentrate , salt, gypsum and coal. Since 1994, concentrates with ilmenite , zirconium and rutile have been transported to a smelting plant in Saldanha by rail . They come from a processing plant in Koekenaap and reach the main line via the branch line from the direction of Bitterfontein . In the 2017/18 financial year, almost 60 million tonnes of manganese ore were transported on the route. Within the state-owned railway company Transnet , the route and the operation form an independent business area and are referred to as Orex (for: Ore export, German: ore export).

The line is the only railway line in the world that is electrified with 50 kV / 50 Hz. In addition to it, there are four other lines in North America that have been electrified with 50 kV / 60 Hz. As with the Black Mesa and Lake Powell Railroad (BM&LP), these are isolated industrial railways with no connection to the rest of the route network. Opened in 1983, operations on the Tumbler Ridge Subdivision of the British Columbia Railway in Canada were discontinued in 2000.

Web links

Commons : Sishen – Saldanha railway line  - collection of images, videos and audio files

• Cornel Truter: The Sishen-Saldanha Railway Line. In: Route 27. (English). 
• Heavy Haul Operations in South Africa. (PDF; 3.4 MB) International Heavy Haul Association (IHHA), June 19, 2011, p. 13 ff (English). 
• Proposed Phae 2 Expansion of the Transnet Iron Ore Handling Facility, Saldanha. Background information document on the environmental impact assessment process. Transnet(English). 
• The five best - giants of the rails. In: YouTube. (from 35:58 the trains running on the route are presented). 

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b c} Willem Kuys: Heavy Haul Operations in South Africa. Transnet, June 19, 2011, archived from the original on October 21, 2013 ; accessed on September 20, 2015 . 
2. ↑ ^{a b c} Description of the route at route27sa.com (English), accessed on June 8, 2013
3. ^ SAIRR : A Survey of Race Relations in South Africa 1973 . Johannesburg 1974, p. 230
4. ^ SAIRR: A Survey of Race Relations in South Africa 1974 . Johannesburg 1975, p. 272
5. ^ South Africa National Legislation Index, 1973. at www.legalb.co.za
6. ↑ ^{a b c d} data sheet at transnetfreightrail-tfr.net (English, PDF; 299 kB), accessed on June 9, 2013
7. ↑ Report and photos at railwaysafrica.com , accessed on June 8, 2013
8. ↑ Application for the establishment of the new alternative point ( Memento of March 4, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) (English, PDF; 85 kB), accessed on June 10, 2013
9. ↑ Sishen-Saldanha Iron Ore Export Line (OREX). In: Railroad Picture Archives.NET. October 2, 2013, accessed November 26, 2015 . 
10. ↑ ^{a b} Transnet tests 375-wagon manganese train . In: International Railway Journal . Volume 58, No. 11 , November 2018, p. 7 .
11. ↑ Rollo Dickson: Orex upgrade targets more capacity . at www.railwaygazette.com (English), accessed June 9, 2013
12. ^ Transnet Freight Rail. Orex. at www.dpe.gov.za ( Memento from September 22, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) (English), accessed on June 9, 2013

Aerial view of a train on the Sishen – Saldanha railway line