Bombardier TRAXX AC Last Mile Locomotive finished 4 000 km test run

Bombardier Transportation and ÖBB’s freight division, Rail Cargo Group (RCG), have successfully completed a 4000-kilometer test run of a BOMBARDIER TRAXX AC Last Mile locomotive. The test run saw a BOMBARDIER TRAXX AC Last Mile locomotive pull a RCG freight train from Sopron, on the Austrian-Hungarian border through Romania and Bulgaria to Istanbul, Turkey (Tekirdag) and back.

The trip followed a long distance intermodal route built by Rail Cargo Group to transport goods between the German Ruhr area to the Black Sea in Turkey. Currently this route has four departures per week with seven per week beginning in January.

The journey was not only a first for both Bombardier Transportation and RCG, but also an unprecedented achievement for this particular train configuration. On the test run, the TRAXX locomotive demonstrated its strength when this single locomotive pulled the 534-meter long, 1200-ton freight train across Romania’s Carpathian Mountains. This rugged terrain typically requires the RCG train to have two locomotives.