И. А. Курбасова Е. И. Силантьева

TEXT 8. FOUR TRAINS IN ONE
A world record is claimed by Soviet Railways (SZD) for running a train of 43,407 tonnes non-stop over a dis­tance of 300 km. The train of 440 loaded coal hoppers was four miles long. It was made up of four "heavyweight" trains coupled together, with a locomotive at the head end and three others (each with its own crew and all interlinked by radio) distributed down the length of the train. The run went without a hitch after much time had been spent in planning and briefings. Assistance was given by the Railway Research Institute and a track fault detector car made a preliminary run over the route. A number of ordi­nary trains had to be sidetracked to ensure a non-stop journey.