A Garratt in Brazil 1998

Regular readers will be familiar with Hose Beraldo's coverage of preserved steam locomotives in Brazil.  These days they seem to do this better than playing football....  Here is his latest contribution:

"This time is Henschel & Sohn 4-8-2+2-8-4, preserved at the small railway museum at the Recife (PE) central station.

Six units were ordered after World War II and delivered to Great Western of Brazil Railway in 1952, series numbers 6966 to 6969 and 7136 to 7137. Total weight was 150 tons, making them a very heavy class for the metre gauge tracks of the Great Western, which lately becomes Rede Ferroviaria do Nordeste and was taken over by RFFSA.

Nr. 612 is well preserved under the station shed and, unless anyone tells me I'm wrong, this is the only big Garratt in existence in Brasil. The photo was taken on December 1995, during my holidays at Recife, state of Pernambuco and the informations about serial numbers are from magazine Centro-Oeste, February 1995, issue 93"