PAROVOZY V MOSKVE.  The 21st century tonnage record for a steam-powered freight train is back in the United States.

Moscow, Iowa, 20 July 2011
Trains Magazine photo by Jim Wrinn

Chinese-built locomotives, derived from the Soviet FD (as in Felix Dzherzhinsky) series of mudsuckers, and from the looks of the consist, either cornstarch cars, or perhaps (note the idler car) a load of ethanol on the head pin.

Iowa Interstate, which bought two Chinese built 2-10-2s in 2006 and previously set a world record for steam-hauled freight tonnage in the 21st century, broke its own record yesterday. The pair of engines hauled 55 loads weighing 7,078 tons from Iowa City, Iowa, to Rock Island. 

Powder River coal trains, which scale out at over 10,000 tons, tend to be in the capable hands of multiple diesels. Thus far, Union Pacific, which has entrusted the circus train and a stack train to its Challenger 3985, has not booked steam on a coal train.