The car plummeted on to the Chat Moss line in Salford, which links Manchester and Liverpool.

When it opened in 1830, the Liverpool and Manchester Railway line was, according to the Science and Industry Museum, external in Manchester, “the world’s first steam-powered, inter-urban railway designed to transport both passengers and goods”.

The museum said: “Goods traffic was at an all-time high between Liverpool and Manchester in the 1820s. Liverpool was the country’s main port for raw cotton, and Manchester’s mills devoured as much of it as they could, sending heaps of finished textiles back to Liverpool and out across the world.”