SEK class Mu-alpha

The SEK class Mu-alpha was a class of twenty 2-10-2 steam locomotives built in Italy in 1953 and 1954 for the Hellenic State Railways, numbered 1001 to 1020. Breda and Ansaldo split the order and built ten each, and Nuove Reggiane made some parts, including whole tender underframes. They were the last steam locomotives bought by the railway before it converted to diesel traction, and they were huge engines by Greek standards, used between Thessaloniki and Athens on freight and on some express passenger trains. As delivered they gave trouble, because a firebox too small for the boiler left them short of steam and their weight, already at the limit, prevented big modifications. Henschel later rebuilt the boilers to burn heavy fuel oil. The class was withdrawn in the early 1970s, and only two examples survived the scrapping of 1984 and 1985, one of them displayed at Rouf station in Athens.