A BRAKE van abandoned at an Essex main line station for around 35 years has been broken up after attempts to save it failed on safety grounds, writes Owen Hayward.
The ‘Shenfield Shark’ will be familiar to many railway enthusiasts. No. DB993733, a ballast plough brake van known as a ‘Shark’ was failed with a hot box during a ballast trip working to Southend Victoria in the late 1980s and shunted into the siding that was to become its home for the next three decades.
Hopes of saving it for preservation over the years had often been set back by concerns of it not being structurally safe to move by rail. Its location between a thick treeline away from a road and overhead power cables on the adjacent Great Eastern Main Line also prevented it from being easily lifted out.