Poland TEM2 043 Ortowice loader Kotlarnia sand mines 25th Sept 2020
Back to the present day. On the afternoon of the September the 25th 2020, a walk of about a kilometre or so down a mine access road brings me into the centre of the excavations near the village of Ortowice. The excavations visited back in 1991 are half way between here and Kotlarnia, and are now replanted with pine trees. This is the furthest extent of the railway, this and a smaller connected pit to its west, right behind Ortowice village. Here I find TEM2-043 and its train, observe the completion of the trains loading and take this photo as it pulls away from the loading point. It has had its fourteen side tippers filled by the rotary bucket excavator behind the train, a chain bucket excavator on the right digs down another level as a cold front piles in from the south east.
The mining equipment remains the same, and I find out, the TEM2 first arrived in Poland on the sand railways, specifically here at Kotlarnia. So, the wheel turns full circle, since 1974 they have worked here, alongside the Ty51 and Ty45, older 2-10-0s too. Now they are painted into their original livery, blue with a high yellow band, and in terms of years worked, they have outlasted the Ty51. If I had turned up in 1991 and found them here I would have walked away and gone elsewhere!
Poland TEM2 043 Ortowice loader Kotlarnia sand mines 25th Sept 2020
Back to the present day. On the afternoon of the September the 25th 2020, a walk of about a kilometre or so down a mine access road brings me into the centre of the excavations near the village of Ortowice. The excavations visited back in 1991 are half way between here and Kotlarnia, and are now replanted with pine trees. This is the furthest extent of the railway, this and a smaller connected pit to its west, right behind Ortowice village. Here I find TEM2-043 and its train, observe the completion of the trains loading and take this photo as it pulls away from the loading point. It has had its fourteen side tippers filled by the rotary bucket excavator behind the train, a chain bucket excavator on the right digs down another level as a cold front piles in from the south east.
The mining equipment remains the same, and I find out, the TEM2 first arrived in Poland on the sand railways, specifically here at Kotlarnia. So, the wheel turns full circle, since 1974 they have worked here, alongside the Ty51 and Ty45, older 2-10-0s too. Now they are painted into their original livery, blue with a high yellow band, and in terms of years worked, they have outlasted the Ty51. If I had turned up in 1991 and found them here I would have walked away and gone elsewhere!