Benguela railway

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The Benguela Railway is a Cape gauge railway in Angola that runs from the port city of Lobito on the Atlantic coast eastward into the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). It connects Angola’s coast with the Copperbelt region and forms part of the broader Cape to Cairo rail corridor. The line also links to Tenke in the DRC and to routes that reach Port Elizabeth in South Africa. The railway’s main purpose is to move minerals, food, industrial goods and livestock for export.

Key facts
- Length: about 1,866 kilometers
- Gauge: 1,067 mm (Cape gauge)
- Maximum speed: 90 km/h
- Highest point: about 1,854 meters above sea level
- Stations: 67; Bridges: 42
- Design capacity: up to 20 million tons of cargo and 4 million passengers per year

History and development
- Construction began in the early 1900s under Portuguese rule. The line reached the border at Luau and connected to the Belgian Congo by 1929, helping to move Congo’s mineral wealth to the Atlantic port.
- In its heyday, the Benguela Railway was a very profitable route. The peak came in the early 1970s, with about 3.3 million tons of cargo in 1973, substantial freight revenue, and thousands of workers.
- After Angola’s independence in 1975 and the civil war that followed, the line was badly damaged. By 1992 only a small portion remained in operation, and by 2001 only about 34 kilometers were still active.

Reconstruction and modern era
- Ownership shifted to the Angolan government in 2001. A major reconstruction program ran from 2006 to 2014, led by the China Railway Construction Corporation, at a cost of around $1.83 billion. The project employed tens of thousands of people, and sections of the railway were gradually reopened between 2011 and 2013, with a formal reopening in 2015.
- In 2018, ore transport from the Tenke Fungurume Mine in the DRC was restarted to Lobito, reestablishing a key freight flow.
- In 2023, the Angolan government announced funding for a new 260 km line from Luena to Saurimo in Lunda Sul province. Also in 2023, the Lobito Atlantic Railway (LAR) company won a 30-year concession to operate the entire Benguela line (through Angola and into the DRC up to Kolwezi), with substantial investment planned.
- The concession was awarded in the presence of heads of state from Angola, the DRC and Zambia. LAR started by ordering hundreds of wagons and locomotives, and operations began at the Port of Lobito’s mineral terminal in July 2024, moving cargo toward the DRC.
- A notable accident in the line’s history is the Tolunda disaster in September 1994, when a train plunged into a canyon after brake failures, killing around 300 people.

Overall, the Benguela Railway remains an important corridor for Angola’s exports and for regional rail links, with ongoing projects aiming to expand capacity and improve cross-border freight and passenger services.