DRG Class SVT 877

The DRG Class SVT 877, nicknamed the Flying Hamburger, was Germanys pioneering fast diesel train, a two-car articulated streamlined unit built by Waggonbau Gorlitz in 1932 and put into service the following year. Powered by twin Maybach diesel engines producing 604 kilowatts and running on lightweight Jakobs bogies, it covered the 286 kilometers between Berlin and Hamburg in 138 minutes, an average of 124 kilometers an hour that set the world record for the fastest scheduled train service of its day, a mark not matched again until Germanys ICE trains took over the same route in 1997. It stayed in service until 1957, and part of the original train survives at the Nuremberg Transport Museum.