Is This Kim Jong Il’s Private Train?
A reader recently directed my attention to these images at RailPictures.net, taken by Danish tourist Asger Christiansen while visiting Vladivostok in 2002. Christiansen believes they show Kim Jong Il’s unmarked private train taking him to a meeting with Vladimir Putin. I contacted Mr. Christian, who graciously allowed me to post the images here. Click for full size.
Apparently, the Russians insisted on using their own locomotives and operators inside Russia. Interesting, too, that Russian and North Korean trains share the same gauge.
News reports confirm that the two heads of state did in fact meet in Vladivostok in August 2002. Many thanks to Asger Christiansen, and to the reader who directed me to these images.
Update: Curtis e-mails to note that Russian and North Korean trains don’t use the same gauge, but neither of us knows whether this is a special-purpose train built for Russian rails, or whether the carriage trolleys can be switched out to make them suitable for Russian gauge.
Are you sure that the two countries share a gague?
It’s just that this very interesting blog by two European train geeks who travelled by train to the DPRK through Tumangan seems to suggest otherwise.
Not that it’s of any consequence whatsoever.
Swapping bogies only takes an hour or so. Trains from China to Mongolia or Russia have to change bogies when they cross the border. I’d suppose North Korean trains do the same thing.