This morning, the Keighley and Worth Valley Railway has announced that Class 50 No. 50035 ‘Ark Royal’ will be visiting the line in the Summer.

The locomotive will be visiting the heritage railway, which runs from Keighley to Oxenhope via Ingrow West, Damems, Oakworth and Haworth in West Yorkshire, for their 8-day 50th-anniversary gala.

The locomotives visit is thanks to The Class 50 Alliance Ltd and is the locomotives first visit to the KWVR.

The locomotive will be taking part in the Mixed Traffic and Diesel Days on the 30th June and 1st July 2018.

A brief history of 50034 Ark Royal

50035 was built in 1968 by English Electric at their Vulcan FOundy Works in Newton-le-Willows. The locomotive originally entered service as D435, which was the numbering system used by English Electric, when British Rail acquired the locomotives, they renumber her to 50035 and was named Ark Royal in the late 1970s when British Rail agreed to their naming of Royal Navy ships used in the First and Second World Wars.

50035 was the first Class 50 to be preserved. The locomotive was handed to the Class 50 fund by British Rail in 1991 at the Old Oak Common Open Day, and ever since, has been a regular sight on its home railway, the Severn Valley Railway.

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