SALDANHA BAY (miningweekly.com) – State-owned rail company Transnet Freight Rail (TFR) on Thursday launched a 4-km-long train, with 375 wagons, officially making it the longest train in the world.

The train was driven by Lisa Clark and transported about 24 000 t of manganese over a distance of more than 860 km between the Sishen mine, in the Northern Cape, and Saldanha Bay.




This breaks Transnet’s own record of a train with 342 wagons, which transports iron-ore along the same Transnet corridor.

Transnet previously reported that the 375-wagon train was decided on as a result of an increase in the production of manganese in South Africa.




Transnet transported about 14.01-million tonnes of manganese in 2018/19, compared with the 9.6-million tonnes transported in 2016/17.

The train takes about eight minutes to pass one by from start to end.

The train is said to go a long way in lowering the cost of doing business in the country and migrating traffic from road to rail and will add R355-million in freight revenue yearly. This will be achieved by optimising the use of existing assets, locomotives and wagons, and within the installed infrastructure constraints.

Transnet operates more than 30 000 km of rail network across the country.

TFR GM Brian Monakali and Transnet business unit head Russell Baatjies were in attendance at the auspicious event on Thursday.