What Happened To America's 183 MPH Jet Train?

The M-497 jet train still holds the American speed mark for a train on an existing main line. On Saturday, July 23, 1966, the New York Central ran a thirteen-year-old Budd commuter car, with two surplus bomber jet engines on its roof, east from Butler, Indiana. Near Bryan, Ohio, the railroad's timing recorded 183.85 miles per hour. This is how it was built in a few weeks, how the runs went, and what the railroad wanted to learn. Narrated with an AI voice. Written with AI help from the sources below, fact-checked by the channel's editor, and approved before publishing. How this was made Research and script. Written with the help of an AI model (Claude, by Anthropic) from the sources below. Each factual claim is checked against those sources, and against a second source where one exists, in two separate AI fact-check passes and then by the channel's editor. Where sources disagree, the narration says so and gives each side. Narration. A synthetic voice from ElevenLabs' built-in voice set. It does not imitate anyone in the story. Pictures. Photographs and documents are real archival material, credited on screen and in the image credits in the pinned comment. Maps, diagrams, title cards and animations are drawn for the channel with software, and drawings of a machine are labeled "illustration." The three pictures of M-497 itself (the opening, 11:09 and the thumbnail) are 3D illustrations made for the channel from the published photographs, given an aged-photo look. They are not photographs. No AI-generated photographs or video of real people, places or events are used. Final checks. The audio is machine-transcribed against the script, and every shot is reviewed against the narration at that moment, both with AI tools. Corrections. If you find an error, please comment with a source. Corrections are listed in the pinned comment. Chapters 0:00 Butler, Indiana, Saturday 2:02 Thirty days earlier, Collinwood 5:31 Bolted rail and hot radiators 8:39 Milepost 347, near Bryan 12:14 Why a railroad bought two jet engines 14:53 Sunday, and Tuesday in Manhattan 17:21 What happened to M-497 Where sources disagree: see the pinned comment. Sources 1. Otto M. Vondrak, "M-497: Built for Speed," Railfan & Railroad, July 2016 issue, posted online November 27, 2019. https://railfan.com/?p=2917 2. Ed Pershey, "Jet Train," Invention & Technology, Fall 1999 (Vol. 15, Issue 2). https://www.inventionandtech.com/node... 3. Old Machine Press, "New York Central M-497 Black Beetle," April 29, 2015. https://oldmachinepress.com/2015/04/2... 4. New York Central System Historical Society Archival Collection, negative NG516340, "RDC-3 #M-497 at Collinwood, Cleveland, OH," July 24, 1966. https://nycshs.omeka.net/items/show/9... 5. Adam Burns, "M-497," American-Rails.com, revised September 11, 2024. https://www.american-rails.com/m-497.... 6. Hank Morris with Don Wetzel, The Flight of the M-497 (2007). 7. The Autopian, "Six Decades Ago The Fastest Train In America Was A 183 MPH Diesel Locomotive With Two Jet Engines Strapped To Its Roof". https://www.theautopian.com/six-decad... 8. GE Reports, "The Jet Train Roars Back," interview with Don Wetzel (2014). https://www.ge.com/news/reports/the-j... 9. Ohio History Connection, historical marker 4-86, "Rail Speed Record," Bryan, Ohio, dedicated 2003. https://remarkableohio.org/marker/4-8... 10. The Journal Gazette (Fort Wayne), "Testing a jet-powered train in 1966," history journal, January 31, 2019, reprinting the 1966 reports. https://www.journalgazette.net/featur... 11. Wikipedia, "Hovertrain" (LIMRV, 255.7 miles per hour, 1974, Pueblo, Colorado). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hovertr... 12. Wikipedia, "New York Central and Hudson River Railroad No. 999" (the 1893 speed figure is disputed). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Yor... 13. Wikipedia, "Metroliner (train)". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metroli...) 14. Encyclopedia of Cleveland History, "Collinwood Railroad Yards," Case Western Reserve University. https://case.edu/ech/articles/c/colli... 15. Christopher T. Baer, A General Chronology of the Pennsylvania Railroad Company, 1966, PRR Technical & Historical Society, April 2015 (entries for May 6, July 19 and July 23, 1966). http://www.prrths.com/newprr_files/Ha... 16. Letter, "A Dangerous Stunt?", Invention & Technology, Winter 2000 (Vol. 15, Issue 3), from the Pennsylvania Railroad's coordinator of the Northeast Corridor Demonstration Project. https://www.inventionandtech.com/node... 17. Wikipedia, "Avelia Liberty". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avelia_... Sources 18 to 20 are in the reply under the pinned comment.