Rob Dickinson's ever-interesting reports on his International steam site are frequently updated, and the Africa page is updated into December 2005, with information about possibilities and tours for 2006. There appears to be still a little revenue working steam and some preservation, though poverty and the high prices for scrap metal have encouraged thieves, who sometimes steal several miles of track and other hardware. Zimbabwe, now a shadow of itself economically, operated commuter trains behind Garratt locomotives earlier this year, mainly due to a shortage of affordable oil for diesels. You can scroll down to the country of interest here:

http://www.steam.dial.pipex.com/africa.htm#Angola

The awful political and social problems aside, it seems to me Zimbawe may well turn out to be the last bastion of steam. Since 1980, it seems they've been through this repeated cycle of pulling the steamers out of storage, restoring and operating them until the economy improves slightly. Then foreign railway consultants come in, convince them that they need new diesels, they buy more diesels and the steamers are mothballed or SCRAPPED as most of the 20th Class 4-8-2+2-8-4's were, the newest Garratts they had. Then the economy goes to pot again, the diesel are eventually side-lined due to lack of fuel and expensive spare parts, and the cycle repeats. They must be on the 4th or 5th iteration of this cycle.

In the late A.E. "Dusty" Durrant's book (his last) on Zimbawe Steam, he relates how Zimbabwe came very close to building new, modern steamers in the early 1980's. The proposed wheel arrangement was 2-10-4, which would have basically been the largest non-articulated engines the trackage would accomodate. All the improvements David Wardale was concurrently fitting to the "Red Devil" Class 26 4-8-4 in South Africa would have been incorporated. Of course, Dusty, being a big fan of Garratts, provided his own serious proposal for a truly monster Garratt for Cape Gauge, a 4-10-2+2-10-4 which would have dwarfed anything that ever ran in Africa.

Seeing that steam is still hanging on, it's a pity some of these modern engines didn't get built when the chance was there.

I heard recently that Dennis Daugherty, the God of Steam himself, was in Malawi looking at regaging some steam locomotives for reactivating the railways there. Here's hoping he gets back safe, and without parasites, and we see another last (penultimate?) bastion in Africa soon.

dave

On the other side of the coin (and world) 100 year old British built wood burning steam is still in revenue freight service at Encarnacion, Paraguay.