Dombås night life.
2 nights of action.
The first night
During the years I have learned after hours of waiting there is not much of action during the Daytime, actually it is hard to see that the line between Oslo and Trondheim is a mainline. The night time is a different scene, as the freight trains take the stage. Dombås is a crew chaninging point, now if you consider a crew of just one person as a crew. Anyway the engineers are cahnged here. As extra boost of the action there is the trains from unelectrified line to Åndalsnes. The freights on this line are seeing a pair of yellow and red Di.8s while the majority of the freights on the main line is seeing El14.s with El16.s filling in. Talikng to a engineer the Swedish built El16.s are not as popular as they deliver less tractive effort compared to the six axeled El14.s.
When we got there, there was a pair of diesels humming idle on the yard. They were coupled to a pair of articulated cars, delivered by an ealier south bound. Next thing that indicated some kind of action was when the north bound signal turned to green and soon EL14 2187 pulled in. After receiving new orders from the agent it pulled away with a typical load of few articulated auto rack cars, and a healthy consist of containers. The load is very typical and infact I couldn't see any Hbiss-class all door cars in any trains at all!
Next thing was the arrival of a freight with El14.2164 with Åndalsnes bound long cut of cars. As before, the consist were made of containers and few auto racks. The electric was switched on a empty track and the diesels got to work, firs coupling the earlier delivered cars to the set, and backing of enough to clear the turn out for the Raumaline track. After pumping air, the both diesels (Di8.703 & Di8.713) pulled out of the town.
Soon one of the more rare appearence of El16.2214 with a south bound followed by south bound night train with El18.2252 on the lead. The consist of this train was rather motley mix of cars a pair of sixties made sleepers followed by B7-generation sleepers of which one sported new design og red, silver and orange. Leased SJ WL 5 in Norwegian markings in SJ blue and black. When the train left it was time for another northbound, now with a El16.2207 on the lead. After short stop, the yard was empty, except for the El14.2164 which was shut of for the night. At 02.30 followed a hour and half long lull and we took of as the weather was cold....
The second night
Wer got curious about when did the south bound freight from Åndalsnes leave so we returned back around 22.00 the following night, if the night before was cold, to night it was a bit mre cold, windy and it was snowing!!! This was 16. of September not middle of January!! It was freezing!The El14.2164 was resting at the same spot but soon it got a bit of attention before the pantograph was raised and not too lomng after that the both diesels arrived to the house track (#1) and were coupled of the train and zig-zacked to their usual parking spot at the east end of the yard. soon after that it was time for a north bound followed by a southbound freight before the venerable electric was coupled to the train. Some ten minutes later, after we got joined by an engineer who happend to be also a railfanning photographer, the train rolled by and left for Oslo.
The cut of cars from north, were a more than in last night and the diesels were coupled to them before they were left idleing at the yard. At 02.04 El18.2242 rolled in with its consist, which included a NSB painted SJ WL5 sleeper, otherwise excpet of no new repainted sleeper looked exactly the same as the night before.
The last action we followed was a northbound freight with El16 2207 once again on lead. The engineers were changed and our new friend took the trainover the grade towards the Dovre mountain. Once again as a closing action we followed the engineer who shut down the El14 for the night.
Few tips
- Think of safety when you are taking pictures, keep yourselves on public areas like the station areas and do not wander about on the yard by yourself. Use your head and don't take any risks!
- In fall and winter, the altitude of 655 meters is not that respectable, but as the yard is located to a hill side facing a along valley the wind really does feel dwon to your bones.
- We used tripods on our cameras and digital cameras, my shots shown here are taken with Canon EOS 300D.
- There are grafic timetables available from Jernbaneverkets home page. To make things easier I have included direct link to the PDF-files.
Eidsvoll-Dombås
Dombås-Trondheim
Rauma-line (Dombås-Åndalsnes)