A STEAM buff has landed the job of a lifetime - restoring a 131-year-old locomotive.

Steve Pickthall, lead electrician at the BP CATS Terminal at Seal Sands, on Teesside, is a lifelong steam locomotive enthusiast, who is leading a project undertaken by the petrochemical firm in partnership with Stockton Borough Council to restore a locomotive which is to feature on one of the borough's busiest roundabouts.

The aim is to brighten up the town by improving its major roundabouts.

Following a suggestion made to the council to highlight Stockton's heritage by featuring a locomotive formerly located in Preston Park on one of the roundabouts, the BP CATS Terminal at Seal Sands offered to support the project.

Mr Pickthall, 50, said: "I remember steam locomotives in regular service. Working on the restoration is a way of keeping old skills alive and enabling future generations to appreciate a totally different way of life.

"We aim to arrest corrosion and bring it back to the original condition it was in when it was built by Head Wrightson, in Thornaby, in the 1870s."

Councillor Geoff Field said: "We are developing roundabout schemes in Thornaby, on a Five Lamps and aerodrome theme, and in Billingham, around its long association with its folklore festival."