Damaged Spoornet wagons help speed up famine relief project

Leonard Neill
DAMAGED SPOORNET bulk grain wagons which were not in service were hastily refurbished recently to assist in the fastest turnaround times ever recorded in rail activity on the Botswana border.
They were used in a
joint operation which saw Spoornet, Botswana Railways and the National Railways of Zimbabwe transportating 10 000 tons of maize from South Africa to Bulawayo as part of a famine relief project.
The joint service was designed on the basis of ring-fencing wagons and locomotives, and involved co-operation with silo operations, receiving depots, customs departments and grain suppliers. It was also arranged that Botswana locomotives would haul wagons on the Zimbabwe lines for the short journey from Plumtree to Bulawayo, which had the immediate benefit of 33% less locomotive changeover time.
Spoornet supplied the damaged wagons on the understanding that the customer Ð in this case a company named Tanminsa Ð would finance the modifications to render these wagons suitable for the project. A team of Tanminsa engineers assisted SpoornetÕs technical staff in Mafikeng, and had the wagons in usable condition in rapid time for the first loadings of the order destined for the Grain Marketing Board of Zimbabwe.
The consignment was hauled by Spoornet in trainloads of 35 wagons each to the Mafikeng area, where they were handed to Botswana Railways for the rest of the journey. On arrival in Bulawayo they were immediately discharged and returned to the silos for reloading in a record average turnaround time of three days.
The total volume of 10 000 tons was transported in less than five weeks.