The locomotive was moved to the museum in 1971. Thanks to the efforts of steam-engine enthusiasts, it was renovated and in 1997 was pressed back into active service, now as a national heritage.
On January 13, 1998, the Guinness Book of World Records certified the darling of the Indian railways as the "oldest working steam locomotive," making it a celebrity of sorts. Steam-train enthusiasts from around the world, and especially from throughout India, arrive to ride on the wonderful smoke-belching black stallion.
The Fairy Queen underwent a major engine overhaul in September at the Railway Mechanical Works in the southern Indian city of Perambur in Tamil Nadu. It was completely stripped and each mechanical part was checked using sophisticated equipment.
Dying Mechanical Art
Maintaining steam engines is a dying art for the Indian Railways because its entire fleet is now either diesel or electric. Seasoned workmen from all over India were recruited for the expert restoration. Overhauling the 19th-century engine took more than a month and cost about U.S. $18,000.
Adbul Qadeer, the mechanical engineer in charge of the delicate restoration, said his team performed essentially "open-heart surgery" on the Fairy Queen, replacing all the aging boiler tubes and old brass bearings. The operation gave the locomotive a new lease on life, enabling it this month to achieve the fastest speed it had ever attained.
Breaking its own speed barrier was no small achievement for the Fairy Queen, said Yogendra Sharma, director of catering and tourism for the Indian Railway Board in New Delhi. Just running the steam locomotive is a major exercise, he said, so putting it back on tracks at record speed was like completing a marathon.
The newly refurbished passenger coaches of the Fairy Queen are equipped with modern amenities, providing a comfortable ride for tourists nostalgic to resurrect the coal-and-steam era—which ended here only several decades ago—when trains used to crisscross the Indian subcontinent.
The acrid smell of burning coal, the hiss of leaking hot steam, and the toot-tooting of the brass whistle are still the same as they have been over a century and a half of service.
Longtime steam-train enthusiast Iain D. Carter, a British national who is chief of safety and environment manager at the Delhi Mass Rapid Transport System, took a long ride on the foot board of the Fairy Queen's engine to experience the excitement of a unique piece of history. Said Carter: "The engine is in fine fitness, and the ride was a dream come true."
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