OO/HO African profile model railway in Kenya: 12 - the desert

A forum that is covering an African profile OO/HO scale model railway being built in Kenya by John Ashworth
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John Ashworth
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OO/HO African profile model railway in Kenya: 12 - the desert

Post by John Ashworth »

An overview of the section of the layout which is going to be the desert.

It's a small manned station with a passing loop and two sidings. There's a catch point protecting the main line from the sidings. There will be home signals at both ends of the loop, operated from a ground frame at the station. The station building is a wood kit from Sarissa's wargaming range - this is actually El Alamein station, though I have renamed it "Station Number 6", as some of the stations in the desert in Sudan only had numbers, not names.

There'll be an airstrip here (hence the small aircraft in the picture, from Oxford models). I'm just about to start constructing an Airfix DC3/C47, which will be parked on the apron being unloaded. I also have a kit of an Antonov An2, a small biplane. I have seen both these aircraft operating in Sudan, and of course the DC3 is still all over Africa (and South America). I have flown in one often, and I have run humanitarian airlifts using one.

There'll probably also be an NGO field hospital, and possibly a UN camp. I'm still wondering where to put a military camp. This might be as good a place as any, as the government would probably want to protect an airstrip being used by the UN and NGOs.
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Re: OO/HO African profile model railway in Kenya: 12 - the desert

Post by John Ashworth »

A closer view of the station building.

The aircraft in the previous post is a Percival Proctor, incidentally.
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Re: OO/HO African profile model railway in Kenya: 12 - the desert

Post by John Ashworth »

I've just completed a Revell plastic kit of an Antonov An-2, which will be taking off from the desert airstrip. It's a nice little kit.

Anotonovs of all shapes and sizes are ubiquitous in Africa. In Sudan and South Sudan I've seen the An-2, 12, 24, 26, 28, 32, 72 and 124, and many of them can be seen at Juba airport on a normal day. I've travelled in most of them (apart from the 2, 12 and 124), and I've taken refuge in bomb shelters from some of them. I watched an An-2 operating from Malakal airport around 2009.

The crew are from a set of train passengers. I hope they look a bit like the type of Ukrainian bush pilots that one finds here!
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