With a double track railway overlooked by towering rock faces, Sandaoling sometimes looked more like a desert main line than a coal mine. The crews clearly thought they were on the main line and drove the locos suitably hard and fast.
JS 8197 put on an impressive show as it accelerated a loaded train away from Ba’erzhan late on the afternoon of 26 November 2016. With 13 side tippers bucking and swaying behind the tender and a crisp exhaust echoing off the cliffs, it certainly looked and sounded the part.
On the other track JS 8081 prepared to push the next set of empties under the loader.