North Yorkshire Moors Railway Annual Steam Gala 2022: All the best photos as Sir Nigel Gresley and guest locomotives arrive

There will be 13 locomotives in steam over the weekend, including three guest engines, the most famous of which is Sir Nigel Gresley.

The loco, fresh from a major overhaul, is one of the A4 Pacific class built at Doncaster and the 100th designed by Great Northern Railway chief engineer Gresley. However, she will be in a semi-matt black livery rather than her traditional blue paintwork due to a delay to further work.

The engine is owned by a preservation trust and was based on the NYMR in the late 1990s, but major defects were discovered in 2009 and a decade-long overhaul began. The work started at the National Railway Museum and was completed at a depot in Crewe. Sir Nigel Gresley’s boiler ticket expired in 2015 and she was taken out of service.

Also visiting is one of the last remaining British Railways Standard Class 5s, also built at Doncaster in the 1950s. No. 73156 has been loaned by the Great Central Railway in Loughborough, is only one of five surviving Standard Class 5 locomotives from the 172 originally built. She returned to the rails in 2017.

The third visitor is a Taff Vale Railway Class locomotive which worked lines in the Welsh Valleys. She was bought and restored by the Keighley and Worth Valley Railway and has been based there since 1970.

The event marks an eagerly-awaited returned to steam at the NYMR, which throughout July and August had to replace many services with diesel due to the drought conditions, which caused several lineside fires.

All images by Charlotte Graham.