Remembering the great storm, 16th October 1987
We all have a few memories of that great storm, I am still astounded that
Despite it’s hurricane severity the wires stayed up locally, even at Ledburn!
I like most of us were in bed that night Heres a report from our intrepid basher TC
who was bashing Hanktons that night…Read on and enjoy!!!
When i finished my late shift on tuesday 14.10.1987,
I had no idea what I was about to get myself into. I
was off until the friday morning, so decided on two
days out on the bash. This was 24 hours before the
1987 storm.
I made my way up to London, not really sure where I
was going to go. Scotland wasn’t really an option with
work on the friday, so I headed for the southern where
there was still a couple of reasonable overnight
moves.I got to Waterloo around 22.30 and found 33208
on the front of the 22.52. 33’s were a favourite of
mine, so I settled on the following move:
33208 22.52 Waterloo – Weymouth
(Waterloo – Eastleigh)
33101 22.52 Waterloo – Weymouth
(Eastleigh – Southampton)
At Southampton I could have headed back towards
London with the 22.38 from Weymouth, but the booked power
forward from Eastleigh put me off!
33031 01.55 Southampton – Bristol TM
(Throughout)
33057 05.00 Bristol TM – Yeovil Pen Mill
(Throughout)
33057 06.55 Yeovil Pen Mill – Bristol TM
(Throughout)
Back at Bristol around 08.30, 33011 was spied coming
off Bath Road. this was a rare low mileage one for me,
so a trip to Portsmouth was called for. At Portsmouth
33008 backed on for the return.
33011 08.00 Cardiff – Portsmouth Hbr
(Bristol TM – Portsmouth Hbr)
33008 12.10 Portsmouth Hbr – Cardiff
(Portsmouth Hbf – Bristol TM)
Bristol at 14.45, with plenty of 33’s on Bath Road,
my train got a 47 forward to Cardiff. I decided to
stay put for a bit. One train I had been after a 33 on
was the 16.15 to Weymouth, which was a Bath road
“chuck out”. today my luck held when 33015 produced,
in the past I have seen 31’s and 47’s on this, even a
45!
33015 16.15 Bristol TM – Weymouth
(Throughout)
This was new track for me beyond Yeovil Pen Mill. At
Weymouth I decided against going back with it as the
19.35 to Bristol, but headed towards Bournemouth with
33101 pushing a “TC” unit as the 18.54 to London.
This was also new track for me to Bournemouth. I
stayed on the train as far as Southampton. To get in
position for an overnight, I headed to Salisbury.
33023 20.25 Portsmouth Hbf – Cardiff
(Southampton – Salisbury)
After some food and a couple of beers, I got on the
21.45 Bristol – Southampton. This train ran via Romsey
and Eastleigh to approach Southampton from the London
direction, due in Southampton around midnight. It then
formed the 01.55 back to Bristol. If you were lucky,
the guard would leave you alone as well.
33027 21.45 Bristol TM – Southampton
(Salisbury – Southampton)
33027 01.55 Southampton – Bristol TM
(Southampton – Bath)
My quote to home the next evening was “I knew there
was something wrong when I woke up and saw daylight
through the window!” The 01.55 was due in Bristol at
04.30. I had slept since about 23.30 the previous
evening, looked at my watch, it was about 07.30, I
hadn’t got a clue where we were, only that we were
stopped. I got up, had a look outside, and thought we
were somewhere just outside Westbury.
During the storm (which I had slept through), loads
of trees had been uprooted, many blocking railway
lines, one very narrowly missing our train. We
eventually moved and got as far as Bath. Still with no
real idea of the amount of damage, I got off the
train, just as 33013 ran in going the other way.
I soon realised I had a big problem. The line south
of Westbury was shut, the line into Paddington was
shut, as was the Southampton – Waterloo line. I stayed
with 33013, as you couldn’t plan any moves. I also
wasn’t sure how I would get home.
I did 33013 to Westbury, back to Bristol and then to
Southampton. There was still no London trains, so I
headed back to Bristol with it. By now there was a
service running through to Reading, so I left my 33’s
and decided to head towards London. During the journey
it was announced that the train would go through to
Paddington, so I eventually got home middle of the
evening.
Watching the news that night, you could see the
damage caused by the storm.
TC’s “Storm machine” 33027 storming out of “Bas” in much better weather a few years earlier with that top “Hankton” train the 1010 Waterloo-Salisbury, 280882
Many thanks to TC for this fascinating report
Leighton Lists 