Narrow-gauge railways in Iraq

The Iraqi Narrow-gauge railways operated in the Ottoman Empire during and briefly after the First World War and were laid using portable track in today's Iraq.

Decauville railway Baghdad-Mufraz

The Decauville Railway Baghdad–Mufraz ran from Baghdad in a southwesterly direction to Mufraz. On March 11, 1917, British forces occupied Baghdad. Shortly afterward, Turkish troops who had fled north destroyed the Sakhlawiya Dam on the Euphrates, flooding an area south of Baghdad through which the first 17.7 kilometres (11.0 mi) of the light railway ran. From March 30, 1917, to April 13, 1917, British soldiers dismantled the line laid with portable tracks and laid it on a new route by April 25, 1917. During the day, the sun's rays made the rails so hot that the soldiers could only touch them if they protected their hands with empty sandbags. Since no expansion joints were available, the tracks experienced a lot of buckling in some sections due to the extreme heat and had to be re-laid in the second half of April 1917.

Decauville railway Baghdad-Ridhwaniya

The hand-operated 600mm-gauge railway line from Ridhwaniya to Baghdad connected the Euphrates with Baghdad. It ran south of the old caravan route from Aleppo via Falluja to Baghdad. It began near the mouth of the Ridhwaniya Canal and led to Baghdad via Abu Thubba, Tel Aswad and the Baghdad suburb of Kharr. In May 1916, the wagons were still pushed by hand.

On the night of April 24th to 25th, 1917, a dam that had held back the Euphrates floods broke, whereupon the road to Falluja and the Decauville railway from Ridhwaniya to Baghdad were flooded and became impassable. In the area where the dam broke, the floodwater was 4.5 m (15 ft) m deep and flowed through the narrow passage at high speeds, making it difficult to repair the dam. To bring sandbags to the dam break, a temporary route made of Decauville yokes and climbing switches was quickly laid there, along which trains with up to 6 tipping wagons loaded with sandbags could be pushed by hand. After the work was completed, the floodwater dropped to below 1 m (3.3 ft).

Light railway Baghdad-Diyala

In May 1917, construction began on a light railway line from Baghdad to the Diyala Front. Due to a lack of metre-gauge material, it was built with a track width of 762 mm from material from the dismantled Sheikh Saad-Sinn line and the abandoned Qurna-Amara line. The route was opened to traffic on July 13, 1917 to Baquba. It was later extended to Table Mountain, 105 km from Baghdad. Between Baquba and Table Mountain, a 6.5 km long branch line opened in 1917, connecting Abu Jezra and Abu Saida on the Diyala River, one of the main tributaries of the Tigris.

Baghdad-Quretu railway

Main article: IRR Eastern Line

Later, a new meter gauge line was laid alongside the existing narrow-gauge line. The Baghdad–Baquba section was opened in November 1917, and the Baquba–Table Mountain section in June 1918. The line initially ran on a wooden bridge over the Diyala River at Baquba. At the end of 1918, the pile bridge was replaced by a permanent structure consisting of four 30 m spans and two 23 m spans on caisson piers. Towards the end of 1918, an extension of this line to Khanaqin on the Persian border was completed. The line was later extended to Quretu, 210 km from Baghdad.

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