[OOC][PLOT] Planning for Arc 1 - Arrivals

[Black Aeronaut]

Why not This bad boy. A source of locomotion of memetic distinction....

I'll see you and raise you by this utter monster....

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pennsylvan...d_class_T1

And I mean it.  These things were the epitome of the phrase 'Super Beast'.

See, here's the funny thing.  While Union Pacific's Big Boy locomotives were, in theory, the most powerful ever built in the USA (and most likely the world for that matter) with their total tractive effort never having been maxed out, the PRR's T1 was never pushed to see how fast they could REALLY go in any official capacity.  And there are unconfirmed reports of these things clocking in as fast as 140mph... And that is WITH A FULLY LOADED TRAIN.  It's theorized that with some relatively minor improvements and better steel in a few key components... Well!  There's no telling how fast these things could have gone....

....Or is there? 

There is an incredibly ambitious group of railway engineers, steam locomotive operators, and highly knowledgeable historians in what is now known as the Pennsylvania Railroad T1 Steam Locomotive Trust that has undertaken the utterly herculaneum effort of building a genuine production model T1-class locomotive.  It will be the 53rd of its long-extinct kind and numbered PRR 5550.  They have already sourced an existing correct model tender to restore, and they've already begun on the locomotive itself by casting the main drivers.

Their ultimate goal?  To go for the World Steam Locomotive Speed Record, currently held by the LNER Class A4 4468 Mallard at 126mph.  And if the PRR T1's really were clocking in over 140mph with a full load, then that might just actually happen!