The locomotives arriving for the 2025 Swanage Diesel Gala continued to arrive with GBRf sending Class 73 No. 73128 ‘Kent & East Sussex Railway’ and Class 69 No. 69007 ‘Richard Trevithick’. These locomotives arrived on May 7th and we saw them on the Swanage Branch at Creech.

Having missed its original diagrammed move to Dorset on May 6th because of urgent repairs to a fuel leak, RES Class 47 No. 47715 ‘Rail Engineering Solutions – Quality Assured’ was collected from the Chinnor & Princess Risborough Railway on the following day by H+H Class 50 No. 50008 ‘Thunderer’ and towed to the Swanage Railway as 0W50 1905 Princes R’boro Ace to Swanage.

The final piece of the jigsaw saw Colas Railfreight Class 56 No. 56090 working 0Z56 1200 Eastleigh East Yard to Swanage on 8th May which completed the line-up for the 2025 Diesel Gala.

Also on Thursday 8th May, a Swanage Diesel Gala Preview Day took place featuring a “Network SouthEast” theme, with Class 47 No. 47715 ‘Rail Engineering Solutions – Quality Assured’ , Class 73 No. 73128 ‘Kent & East Sussex Railway’, and Class 423 4VEP No. 3417 ‘Gordon Pettit’ in action alongside resident steam locomotive SR 4-6-2 “Battle Of Britain” Class No. 34072 ‘257 Squadron’

Unusually for me, I spent the next three days on the Swanage Railway and enjoyed haulage behind the Colas Grid and the NSE Duff.

And then it’s all over for another year. The visiting locomotives all departing over the course of the following two days, with the exception of Class 20 No. 20066 which is having an extended stay on the Swanage Railway to help out with locomotive rostering duties.

Thanks for reading – the best way to keep up to date with our latest videos is via the Railway Dog YouTube Channel – why not subscribe today! Or you can catch random witterings and photos via the Railway Dog Facebook group.

And don’t forget the first episode of The Railway Dogcast is still available:

Spotify: https://creators.spotify.com/…/The-Railway-Dogcast…

YouTube: https://youtu.be/Shgg86eCQh4?si=MDKhufV9X0x7gyg8

Be Seeing You!