PASSENGER Rail Agency of South Africa (Prasa) has signed a Rand 51bn ($US 5bn) contract with the Gibela joint venture led by Alstom to supply 3600 cars to be formed into 600 emus during a 10-year period, plus spare parts for 18 years. Financial closure of the contract is expected in December.

SWIFAMBO Rail Leasing, South Africa, has awarded a €250m contract to Vossloh for 70 electro-diesel passenger locomotives which will be leased to the Passenger Rail Agency of South Africa (Prasa) to haul passenger trains. The contract includes options for a minimum of 10 additional units as well as to maintain the fleet.

TRIALS have started in South Africa with three locomotives fitted with a system called Jika passive hydraulic steering (PHS) which is aimed at trebling the life of locomotive wheels and reducing track wear by 60%.

BRITISH mining company Beacon Hill Resources has been granted a 7.7% capacity allocation on Mozambique's Sena Line, which will allow it to transport coking and thermal coal from the Moatize Basin in Tete province to the Indian Ocean port of Beira.

CSR Zhuzhou Electric Locomotive, China, has unveiled the first of 95 Class 20E dual-voltage electric locomotives for Transnet Freight Rail (TFR), South Africa, which were ordered last October from the CSR E-loco Supply consortium at a cost of Rand 2.6bn ($US 298m).

RUSSIAN freight wagon producer Uralvagonzavod (UVZ) has indicated an interest in establishing an assembly facility in Angola to build rolling stock for railways in southern Africa.

THE Alstom-led Gibela consortium has selected a site at Ekurhuleni in the South African province of Gauteng as the location for a Rand 2bn ($US 201m) rolling stock plant, which will assemble commuter trains for Passenger Rail Agency of South Africa (Prasa).

ALGIERS Metro Enterprise (EMA) has awarded a contract worth about €20m to Siemens to install communications-based train control (CBTC) on a 4km underground extension to Line 1 of the Algiers metro.

BOTSWANA Railways (BR) has issued a call for tender for the supply of eight diesel-electric locomotives. BR currently has a fleet of 38 locomotives of three different types.

TRANSNET Freight Rail (TFR), South Africa, is to introduce 200-wagon trains between the coalfields of Mpumalanga province and the port of Richards Bay in an effort to increase the capacity of the corridor to 81 million tonnes in the next financial year.