Sinara Transport Machines’ Lyudinovo Diesel Locomotive Plant has supplied a TEM9 shunter to ARMZ Uranium Holding’s Priargunsky Industrial Mining & Chemical Association business. The four-axle loco has a 1 200 hp diesel engine with microprocessor controls, electric transmission, CCTV, AGS8 wheel flange lubrication and a fuel consumption monitoring system with a GLONASS and GPS module. It can operate on curves down to 50 m radius.
Alstom has commissioned the first seven of 40 Prima T8 AZ8A electric locomotives ordered by Azerbaijan Railways and produced by the EKZ joint venture in Kazakhstan. They are to be used on the main freight transit line from the Caspian Sea to the border with Georgia, which has recently been converted from 3 kV DC to 25 kV AC. ‘Despite the important challenges imposed by the global pandemic we have been able to produce, conduct all necessary validation tests and deliver ready-to-run locomotives’, said Guillaume Tritter, Managing Director of Alstom in Western & Central Asia.
Turkish freight forwarding company Mars Logistics has launched an intermodal service connecting Halkalı in Istanbul with the new T-PORT terminal at Kolín in the Czech Republic. The first train departed on June 19 and arrived at Kolín five days later, carrying 45 ft containers and swap bodies loaded with goods primarily for the automotive industry. The service will initially run weekly, increasing to three train pairs a week in late August. Haulage is provided by TCDD Taşımacılık, PIMK Rail, Srbija Kargo and PKP Cargo International.
Sinara Transport Machines has won a contract to supply five TEM10 modular shunting locomotives with pairs of Volvo Penta diesel engines meeting EU Stage III emissions standards to the Magnitogorsk Iron & Steel Works. ‘Especially important from the economic point of view are the high fuel efficiency and the low operating costs’, said Anton Zubikhin, STM Deputy General Director for Sales. ‘It is a relatively cheap machine with a number of operational advantages: it has two power units, which can save up to 28% of fuel if compared with similar locomotives.’
Polish leasing company Cargounit has taken delivery of the last of five Siemens Mobility Vectron MS locos ordered for use by Bahnoperator on intermodal flows in Poland, Germany, Austria, the Netherlands, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary, Romania, Slovenia, Croatia and Bulgaria.
DB Cargo UK has successfully trialled a new service for new-to-rail customer Marcegaglia, transporting almost 3 000 tonnes of steel coil from the port of Sunderland to its steel logistics centre in Wolverhampton. The service ran twice in June, removed the need for more than 120 lorry movements, and marked the first commercial freight trains to be loaded in the port for more than 20 years.
From July 5 TX Logistik is increasing the frequency of its intermodal service from Kaldenkirchen on the German-Dutch border to Malmö to five return trips per week.
Kansas City Southern and Midstream Texas Operating have announced a long-term commercial agreement to provide truck-to-rail transloading services for petroleum and petrochemicals from Corpus Christi, Texas, into Mexico. Operations are expected to begin in Q4 2021.
