UKRAINE: ArcelorMittal has awarded Czech manufacturer CZ Loko a contract to supply four 1 520 mm gauge EffiShunter 1600 Bo-Bo diesel-electric locomotives for heavy shunting at its Kryvyi Rih steelworks.
The order is being financed by OTP Leasing, with delivery scheduled for the second half of 2020. The locos will have CAT 3508B engines with AC-DC transmission and will comply with GOST technical standards.
The steelworks currently has a fleet of around 200 locomotives various Soviet-era designs, of which around 140 are in service.
In 2007, CZ Loko modernised one CME3 six-axle diesel locomotive for Ukrainian Railways in collaboration with the PRZZT rolling stock overhaul plant in Poltava. However, series modernisation never got underway because of the outbreak of war in eastern Ukraine in 2014.
Elsewhere in the 1 520 mm gauge region, CZ Loko has modernised several dozen ČKD or Soviet-built locomotives for operators in Belarus, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Finland.
