“It won’t happen again”, promises Network Rail after £80k fine

From: Safety & Health Practitioner
Network Rail has been fined £80,000 and ordered to pay full costs of £32,000 after a train hit a collapsed public footbridge and came off the rails, injuring the train driver and all the passengers on board.

Leicester Crown Court, sitting on 3 October, heard that on 1 February 2008, a lorry delivering bulk material in darkness at 6am to a Network-Rail construction site near Barrow upon Soar station struck a footbridge over the railway with its upraised tipper, causing the bridge to collapse and block the rail line. A short while later, a train travelling from Nottingham to Norwich at 65 mph crashed into the debris and derailed.

The six passengers on the train suffered shock and minor injuries, while the train driver had to be freed from his cab by emergency services and sustained bruising, cuts and cracked ribs.

An investigation by the Office of Rail Regulation (ORR) found that Network Rail had failed to properly plan, manage, and supervise deliveries of ballast to its worksite. In this instance, the lorry had been allowed to drive along the site with its tipper body not fully lowered after emptying its load.

Commenting on the case, Allan Spence, ORR’s deputy chief inspector of railways said: “Network Rail’s poor planning and management of the construction site at Barrow upon Soar station placed the public, passengers and railway staff in great danger.

“Given the circumstances, it is very fortunate that no one on the train was seriously injured and that no one was crossing the footbridge when it collapsed.

“It is essential that incidents such as this never happen again. Since the time of this accident, Network Rail has made significant progress, acting on our recommendations to improve safety at its construction sites.”

Network Rail was fined £40,000 on each count for breaching the Health & Safety at Work act 1974 by failing to ensure the safety of employees and non-employees. A third charge of breaching the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999 by failing to effectively plan, organise and control preventive and protective measures, did not carry a fine.  Network Rail had previously pleaded guilty to all three charges at Loughborough Magistrates’ Court.

After the sentencing, a spokesperson for Network Rail said: “Network Rail accepts that it should have done more to have prevented this accident. We did carry out risk assessments at the time, but we did not foresee the possibility of a lorry driver leaving site and failing to lower his tipper for several hundred yards – this is what happened and we should have done more.
 
“We have changed the way we carry out such work since the accident and passengers can be confident it won’t happen again.”

On This Day: 5 October 1999

At least eight people are confirmed dead and 160 injured after two trains collided near Paddington Station in west London at the height of the morning rush hour.

Thirty-nine people are seriously injured, with three critically ill and 11 in intensive care.

There are thought to be some 200 with minor injuries.

Many more passengers could still be trapped in the wreckage, said Chief Inspector Brian Gosden of British Transport Police.

Hospitals across the capital are taking in casualties. St Mary’s Hospital has cancelled all out-patient appointments to treat most of the wounded.

The walking wounded are being treated at a local school and Sainsbury’s supermarket.

A Thames Trains 0806 BST from Paddington to Bedwyn in Wiltshire collided with the incoming 0603 BST Great Western 125 express train from Cheltenham at 0811 BST.

Carriages came off the track and one train burst into flames. A massive column of smoke could be seen across west London.

Up to 30 ambulances, 12 fire engines and 70 firefighters rushed to the scene.

Mark Rogers, a passenger on the 0806, said: “There was an almighty crash and the train rolled over and over, first onto its roof and then onto its side.

“One woman I saw thrown out of the window and she was trapped beneath the train. She was at least very severely injured.

“It is absolute pandemonium. ”

Mr Rogers said the carriage behind the driver had been “ripped apart like a sardine can” and was lying over the top of the 125 Great Western train.

“It is chaos. There are doors and broken glass lying everywhere.”

Prime Minister Tony Blair said: “I am absolutely appalled by what is a truly dreadful tragedy.”

Transport Secretary John Prescott has promised a public inquiry into the crash and praised the “swift efforts of all the emergency services”.

Conservative Transport spokesman John Redwood said: “We need a proper inquiry and we need some answers for the future.”

The trains collided on the same stretch of line as the Southall rail crash in 1997, in which seven people died and 150 were injured.

Health and Safety Executive inspectors are at the scene.

 

What’s Happened Since The Crash Occurred

Investigations revealed how 31 people died and dozens were injured because of a head-on collision when one of the trains passed a red signal.

Public inquiries were headed by Scottish judge Lord Cullen. He made dozens of safety recommendations and concluded Railtrack, the company then in charge of rail infrastructure and its investment, had failed to respond to earlier warnings about signalling problems.

He also criticised the Health and Safety Executive’s Rail Inspectorate and recommended an independent Rail Industry Safety Body.

Another inquiry comparing the Ladbroke Grove disaster with the 1997 Southall crash recommended implementing sophisticated safety technology.

Thames Trains was fined a record £2m in April 2004 for breaking health and safety laws. The court was told the train driver had not been warned about problems with the signal at Ladbroke Grove and had not received adequate training.

In December 2004 the Paddington Survivors’ Group complained that many of the safety recommendations made after the crash in 1999 had still not been implemented.

A year later, in December 2005, the Crown Prosecution Service said no individuals would face criminal charges over the crash as there was “insufficient evidence” to provide a realistic prospect of conviction”.

In October 2006, Network Rail admitted health and safety breaches concerning the siting of the signal. It received a record fine of £4 million for its part in the crash on 30 March 2007.

New GBRf Livery Unveiled

GBRf 66720 after being unveiled at the Nene Valley Railway

The first ever freight locomotive livery to be designed by a six year old girl was revealed by GB Railfreight (GBRf) at a special ceremony at the Nene Valley Railway on Sunday 3rd July.

The unveiling followed the naming of a Class 66 loco ‘Jayne’ after Jayne Taylor, GBRf roster manager at Doncaster, maintaining GBRf’s tradition of naming its engines after female employees.

Emily Goodman, the now seven year old daughter of GBRf’s Whitemoor-based Yard Shift Leader Ben Goodman, won a kids’ ‘design a livery’ competition last autumn, run on one of the company’s annual family days out.

Her two colourful designs of night and day were chosen by a panel of judges, including MD John Smith and now feature on both sides of loco, 66720.

Joining Emily at the ceremony were mum and dad, Julie and Ben, along with sister Sophie and brother Josh.

Ben, who is now training to become a train driver, said: “Emily, crayon in hand, drew a day-night theme for the loco complete with sun, moon and alien!  It’s a delight to think that I could soon be driving a loco up and down the country with her design on its sides.”

John Smith paid tribute to Emily’s designs and to those who turned her original colourings into the huge vinyls that now cover the loco.  He said: “I think the loco looks great.  It’s colourful, eye catching and a bit of fun.  My thanks to all who made this possible.”

Emily’s design ended up applied to the loco thanks to the work of a team of GBRf’s engineers, graphic design suppliers and vinyl manufacturers.   Her original drawings were given to graphic designers, Woodhouse Creative, who turned them into artwork, which was then sent to vinyl manufacturers SSDM.  They produced the massive vinyl sheets and then applied them at GBRf’s March depot.

Railway Humour – Signalbox to Driver Conversation

I heard this one ages ago but never got round to posting it up.

This is a recording of a real conversation between a signalman and a train driver stopped at a red signal.  The explaination of the stop is an absolute classic not to be missed.

WARNING!!  Due to adult language and topic of conversation, this video is not suitable for younger viewers.

Stationmaster SACKED for leaping onto tracks and pulling trolley out of path of oncoming trains

Original Source: Daily Mail

A dedicated station master has been sacked after 27 years working for the same company – for pulling a shopping trolley off the track.

Ian Faletto jumped onto the line at Lymington Pier train station, Hants, and pulled the obstacle back onto the platform after it was chucked on by yobs.

He was dismissed for ‘a serious breach of safety’ by heartless South West Trains for his act of bravery, which prevented a crash with oncoming trains.

Ian, who managed Lymington Town, Lymington Pier, Ashurst and Beaulieu Road stations, spent hundreds of pounds a year of his own money on flowers for the four stations he looked after, went in on his days off to man them and provided free sweets and jigsaws for passengers.

And the 49-year-old – who wore a buttonhole to work and even spent his own money having carpets and heaters installed in his stations – was said to be furious at the decision.

‘What I did prevented an accident,’ he said.

‘I saw the trolley on the line at Lymington Pier, got power turned off and managed to remove it before the first train arrived that morning.

‘I can’t believe they have sacked me after all I have done for them.

‘I have gone in on days off and spent thousands of pounds of my own money making the stations the best they can be.

‘I don’t know how how I am going to get by now – because I was sacked I have lost my mortgage protection and my pension.

‘I will have to find a way, but the trains are all I know.’ Ian, who is taking South West Trains to a tribunal, has had a flood of support from passengers who are signing a petition to get him reinstated.

Petition organiser Reverend Alex Russell, 52, said, ‘He always went the extra mile for passengers.  “No one has ever had a bad word to say about him. People have been driving miles to come to the station just to sign my petition.

‘He has been sacked for breach of Health and Safety but there is an exception rule if it is an emergency.

‘I would have thought stopping an accident on a railway track is an emergency.

‘His life is ruined. He has worked for the railways for 27 years and has nothing else.’

Ian, from Southampton, worked at nearby Sway station for 15 years, where he won several awards, before moving to Lymington.

Just ten weeks after he transferred in 2006 Lymington was named the most improved station in the region.

But his perfect track record did not stop South West Trains giving him the sack.

A South West Trains spokesman said: “We can confirm that an employee has been dismissed for a serious breach of safety.

‘All our employees are aware of the importance of complying with the strict rules governing railway safety, which we have a duty to enforce.’

Comment: Unfortunately the media have done their usual fine job of rushing to get a story to print and therefore there is a lot of information missing from this article.  On the ‘facts’ presented it would seem that Southwest Trains have acted harshly in their treatment of Mr Faletto but there are questions that needed to be asked that obviously weren’t.

When you begin work on the railways, your job description falls under two distinct headings.  Safety Critical and Non Safety Critical.  Safety Critical staff (Train Drivers, Guards, Track Workers, Train Dispatchers) all undergo stringent training which leads to them being issued with a Personal Track Safety (PTS) Card.  This is basically to say that they have been trained to access the track safely and are aware of the way they are expected to act.

Non Safety Critical staff (Revenue Staff, Booking Office Staff, Customer Service Staff, Etc.) are not required to access the tracks or have any input into the operations side of the railway and therefore do not possess PTS cards.

Every time I have attended an induction course for a Train Operating Company (TOC), the message is hammered home that as Non Safety Critical staff, you do not access the track for ANY reason.  This is due to the fact that no training is given in track safety.  The correct procedure is for the member of staff to immediately contact the signalman using a post telephone or other means to inform of the blockage/casualty, this will allow the signalman to set signals to danger and arrange for power supply to the track to be switched off (where appropriate).  The procedure then calls for someone who is PTS trained to access the track and deal with the situation.

EVERY TOC I have worked for has been VERY explicit in the fact that they all declared that any non safety critical staff who access the tracks will face severe disciplinary action (normally dismissal) and some will even call for prosecution.

With this in mind, the original story now seems to have been vastly blown out of all proportion and, if Mr Faletto was indeed Non Safety Critical, then Southwest Trains have acted properly and the matter should be allowed to drop.  If, however Mr Faletto is a PTS card holder then there is obviously something else going on that needs further analysis.