Tickets for the Severn Valley Railway’s three days of ‘Flying Scotsman’ services sold out within three minutes, but now the heritage line has managed to secure the iconic locomotive for an additional day on Monday 28 July.
SVR managing director, Jonathan ‘Gus’ Dunster said, ‘We are incredibly grateful to the National Railway Museum and Northern Steam Operations Limited for agreeing to this extension to 60103’s stay with us. Clearly, SVR supporters are hugely keen to travel behind this world-famous loco, and we want as many people as possible to be able to do that at the Severn Valley Railway.
‘It’s true that ‘Flying Scotsman’ doesn’t often run on heritage lines, and we are especially pleased that it will be with us, in our 60th anniversary year, to haul this season’s first full-line service on Friday 25 July, staying with us for an additional three more days. We’ll be reuniting the whole 16 miles of our line, following the repairs to the landslip at Mor Brook bridge.
‘On 26 and 27 July, ‘Flying Scotsman’ will be part of our Swinging Sixties event, with three additional steam-hauled services on offer including a double-header, plus a further heritage diesel-hauled service. Everyone attending will get plenty of opportunity to see ‘Flying Scotsman’ even if they haven’t been able to secure tickets to travel behind it.’
The SVR has confirmed it will be putting an additional 1,000 tickets for ‘Flying Scotsman’ travel on sale, at 10am on Tuesday 8 July. These include standard tickets, as well as first class seats and the opportunity to travel in an elegant observation saloon.
On the extra day of services, Monday 28 July, ‘Flying Scotsman’ will haul three return trips from Kidderminster to Bridgnorth; there will be no other services running.
‘Flying Scotsman’ tickets for 28 July will be available from 10am on 8 July, and Swinging Sixties tickets are already on sale at svr.co.uk.