SILKWAY Transit, a Kazakhstan rail freight operator, has ordered 22 two-section 2ES7 ‘Black Granite’ electric locomotives from Sinara Transport Machines (STM), Russia, which will be delivered within nine months.

Ural Locomotives will build the eight-axle, 8.8MW, 1520mm-gauge, 120km/h, 25kV ac locomotives, with the first locomotive due to be handed over before the end of 2021.

The contract for the units stipulates they must all complete 3000km trial running before being deployed on 9000-tonne trains within Kazakhstan.

“The contract has become one of the largest export projects in the history of our company,” says Mr Anton Zubikhin, STM deputy general director for sales and general director of STM Trading House. “In the past 10 years, the rail freight turnover structure has changed significantly: we can see a west-to-east reorientation.” This contract follows the handover of four TEM14 shunting locomotives for SilkWay Transit in June.

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