It was with a sense of excitement that we heard during the week that a Railway Preservation Society of Ireland, steam-hauled train would visit Cork City on Friday and Saturday as part of a six-day private charter tour, The Emerald Isle Explorer.

Saturday 18th June promised be the best day to view and photograph the train in the Cork area as the locomotive, WT Class 2-6-4T No.4 Tank Engine, would haul the 09.35hrs train from Kent station to Killarney. She would run, boiler first, to Mallow where, after taking on water, would proceed bunker first to Killarney. A recce of prospective vantage points was hurriedly done on Friday in preparation for the run for which the weather forecast was looking very favourable.

By 8.30am on Saturday, the locomotive was already well in preparation for the run as it sat, puffing silently, alongside two modern siblings in the sidings of Kent station. The coaches were also in preparation with staff attending to the final details.

Shortly after 9am, a diesel shunted the coaches into position alongside the mainline platform in the station while the locomotive ran around the outside of the station building, into the tunnel and reversed back to be coupled to them. Right on time and to the accompaniment of huge volumes of steam, smoke and a loud whistle, the train departed into the tunnel leaving many wide eyed children (and adults) behind who were only too glad to have caught a glimpse of times gone by.

See a gallery of images from the shoot here. Enjoy!