27th March 1989

Network South East Class 442 EMU no. (44)2408 is working the 15.51 Weymouth to London Waterloo service, seen here leaving the station. The "Plastic Pigs", as they were colloquially known, were built specifically for this route, introduced in 1988 after the 750vDC third rail electric system was extended from Bournemouth to Weymouth. They fell out of favour with South West Trains in 2007 but in recent times (writing this in 2021) SWT's successor South Western Railway had just spent £45m refurbishing and upgrading 18 of the 24 units for service to Portsmouth. But as with the way things are on Britain's railways, £45m is money they can clearly afford to throw away, given that SWR changed their minds and have now decided to withdraw them before they had been reintroduced, and refurbish the Class 458s instead! So it looks like the scrap yard for the 442s. As they say, you couldn't write it!