Yesterday, I finally got a chance to see one of the most popular and well recognised steam locomotives of recent times, the LNER Peppercorn A1 Class 60163 Tornado, back in service on the Nene Valley Railway. Tornado has finally returned after being away for a few years for an overhaul, having done a couple of test runs on the Great Central Railway, and is hauling passenger trains for a brief period on the NVR, and will eventually return to its mainline duties! This locomotive is very famous for being the 50th Peppercorn A1 built, done so to represent its class as none of the original 49 members were saved from scrap after being withdrawn in the 1960s.

This locomotive is also famous for being involved in the big Race to the North episode of Top Gear back in 2009, when the lead presenter Jeremy Clarkson was part of the crew aboard Tornado racing against James May who was in a Jaguar XK120, and Richard Hammond on a Vincent Black Shadow bike.