Dinara, Kozara, Sutjeska and Neretva are names of famous battles which the Yugoslav partisans fought against the Germans during the Second World War in Yugoslavia. What many people maybe do not know (even if they would know the names of these battles) is that there are also locomotives with these epic names. These locomotives are still in service by the Serbian Railways (Železnice Srbije) and are the 666-001 “Dinara”, 666-002 “Kozara”, 666-003 “Sutjeska” and 666-004 “Neretva”.
They were pulling the Blue train (=plavi voz in Serbian) which was the train of nobody less than Josip Broz Tito, the Yugoslav president. These diesel electric locomotives were produced by General Motors in the United States in 1978 under their manufacturer’s mark JT 22CW-2. When they started their service by the Jugoslovenske Železnice, ( JŽ= Yugoslav Railways) they came in service as series 666 (yes with an evil number).
The series JŽ 666 replaced the series JŽ 761, which were built in 1957 by the German company Krauss-Maffei AG. Also these three locomotives had mythical names which were “Dinara” for the 761-001, “Kozara” for the 761-002 and “Sutjeska” for the 761-003.
Before the JŽ 761 there were the steam locomotives JŽ11 series which were pulling Tito’s personal train.
Long Tito could not enjoy his new locomotives from the USA as the leader from Yugoslavia died in 1980. The last locomotives of the Blue train (series JŽ 666) are still in service in Serbia.
You want to read more about the blue train ? Visit this link : Blue train / plavi voz
