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The Atlantic coast of Santa Cruz province Río Gallegos The owners were almost immediately taken over by the Swift Beef Co, and it is as the 'Swift' plant that the frigorifico was known for the rest of its life. It survived until the 1970s, but the derelict buildings remain, as seen below.
Within the abandoned frigorifico track still survives, as seen below.
The plant had one steam locomotive, an Avonside 0-6-0T, no. 1592 of 1910. This also still survives, though in an extremely poor condition. The drawing was taken from an Avonside catalogue of the 1920s. The loco was of their class NB. This was a small design, weighing only six and a half tons in working order, and available for gauges between 2' and 3' 6". (1).
The photo below shows it in 2000, in the local museum's outdoor facilty near the big roundabout that was at the time on the southern outskirts of town. More recently it has been moved (along with the RFIRT's Henschel 0-8-0CT) to the Amigos del Tren compound near the old RFIRT loco shed (2).
A single flat wagon lay near the loco. It seems likely that this came from the Swift plant, despite the chopper coupling. The loco has link and pin couplers, and it is probable that the chopper variety was added mistakenly from one of the ex-Puerto Militar wagons in the RFIRT yard.
The Swift muelle had a rail-mounted steam crane on it, of unknown gauge though almost certainly wider than the 3' 6" of the main frigorifico system. The following photo, by Señor Walter Roil, shows the steam crane lifting a load of sacks from what may be narrow gauge wagons on the muelle. [This photo belongs to an unrelated website, which can be accessed directly by clicking on the image.]
Rio Gallegos seems to have had additional narrow gauge railway tracks along its foreshore, probably of 60cm gauge and linking to the 'Enosis' muelle.
These two pictures were taken by Señor Walter Roil, a professional photographer in Rio Gallegos. The one above was taken in 1940 and the other in 1935. [These photos belongs to an unrelated website, which can be accessed directly by clicking on the images.]
The two photos shown here were taken from Argentina Austral magazines of the 1920s. They were taken on the occasion of carcases from estancias Bella Vista and El Condor being loaded for shipment north in the steamer José Menendez. 60cm gauge railway tracks can be seen in both illustrations.
A final photo by Señor Roil was taken in 1935 when the Australian polar explorer Sir Hubert Watkins was flying to Antarctica. This shows some rather heavy weight track along the foreshore, made up , most unusually for Argentina, of bullhead rail in keyed iron chairs. This may well be part of the Swift system. [This photo belongs to an unrelated website, which can be accessed directly by clicking on the image.]
Puerto Santa Cruz
First a view from the edge of the escarpment, showing the plant's location on the point between the Río Santa Cruz on the right and the Río Chico to the left. The open sea is ahead. Next a view within the confines of the frigorifico. By 2011 all portable items such as wagons and loose rails had been removed for scrap but any track embedded in concrete remained in situ.
Finally, the full size Grafton steam crane (probably broad gauge, but see Pto. San Julian below), with the remains of one of the two muelles behind. . Puerto San Julian Like other similar facilities, this frigorifico was located with a view to the raw materials arriving on their own four feet and the finished product being shipped northwards by sea in moderate sized vessels well able to load from a small private jetty or 'muelle'. As such sites might be a long way from any town a workers' barracks (left of picture) was an essential part of the whole.
On first inspection (May 2011) the internal tracks and those to a nearby loading point appeared to be of 60cm gauge. This track below now leads over a cliff edge but almost certainly this was to one of two muelles.
Like most other abandoned locations all easily moved metalwork has been stripped out. However, this skip wagon body would appear to have been missed by the scrappers. Its metalwork looks perhaps to have been galvanised, maybe a pragmatic feature in a meat freezing plant, unless this is just the result of life in a semi-desert climate.
Opportunistic scrap merchants sometimes balked at stripping out heavy plant, especially when it had been concreted into place. This Scotch boiler has thus survived.
Having seen 60 cm gauge tracks, this metre gauge trackwork (below) leading from a wool compressor or weighbridge shed prompted a quick reassessment. Perhaps the route along the clifftop to the main muelle had used larger wagons.
Strangely, it appears that the trackwork to the main muelle was in fact of three-rail mixed gauge. This location is a couple of hundred yards from the main buildings and on a steady gradient. Haulage uphill, albeit of empty wagons, would seem to have needed more than merely man-power.
Compounding the surprises, this Grafton steam crane, now sadly very incomplete, is of standard gauge, and on bullhead rail, a distict rarity in the Argentine! The muelle on which it ran was probably more like a short platform constructed to level out the clifftop, for there is deep water close inshore and a conventional facility built out over the water may not have been necessary.
In a sheltered tidal bay, closer to the main buildings, there still lies the frigorifico's own tug. The scrap merchants have not omitted to recycle the bronze propellor.
Puerto Deseado The big frigorifico was built in the late 1920s by the Soc. Coop. Frigorifica de Puerto Deseado which was a Braun-Menendez company, but was operated for many years by CAP, the Corporación Argentina de Productores de Carnes. Unusually it seems not to have had its own muelle, all produce being taken back through town to the main port facilities. This may be because the factory, whilst on the shore, faces a wide area of shallow reefs. More recently it has been taken over by CARSA and now functions primarily as a freezer plant for seafood, rather than as an abattoir and meat freezer. However, this new use has resulted in the preservation of most of the 1920s equipment, albeit now disused. The upper floors still contain the carcass-processing production line and the rendering boilers for the production of tallow. More to the point, a large Robey tandem compound stationary engine survives on the ground floor, superficially well cared for though not in working order. This may be the last frigorifico in Patagonia containing early 20th century equipment; all others from that period having closed and been stripped of their fittings. The Robey compound engine was directly connected to a pump for the refrigeration system. This is the blue item behind the left of the fly wheel.
As far as railway operations are concerned, there are still 60cm gauge tracks in the old fleece drying yard, and the tail end of a broad gauge siding for much of this frigorifico's raw material arrived by rail.
The wooden racks between which the 60cm gauge tracks remain (above), held wires on which the fleeces were dried before compressing into bales. In the photo below (courtesy of CARSA staff) the drying yard is full of fleeces and the narrow gauge tracks can be seen to the right.
The broad gauge siding led directly off the main FCE yard at Puerto Deseado station. Whilst most has been lifted, the tail end and buffer stop remain.
When first in Comodoro Rivadavia in 1975 I was told that there had been a narrow-gauge steam-worked line at Puerto Deseado as late as 1972. However, the CARSA staff in 2011 were emphatic that their rail system had used only man-power. Further north References:
13-05-11 |
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Main pages
Chapter 8
The big estancias and 'frigoríficos'
