Terrified commuters forced to flee burning train

[Electrostar]

As a long-time regular Southeastern commuter I'd say most commuters are aware the trains on this line use an electrified third rail. We've had years of hearing about it every time snow falls. On a packed service like this I'd suggest some commuters would be aware of the danger and warn anyone opening the doors. That's not to say they know which side the third rail is located but I think on peak hour trains someone in the crowd will be aware it's there.

I too am surprised that the driver was unaware the door was open. Even if he wasn't aware passengers had disembarked I assumed opening a door via the emergency controls would raise an alarm in his cab. Of course if the smoking shoe gear also raises an alarm then how or if you can differentiate between the two I don't know.

Certainly the driver had lots to do. Looking out of the right hand window mightn't have been first on his mind. I assume had it been a Southern 377 of LO 378 the driver could see what was going on from the side-view CCTV, again assuming these are always-on or triggered to come on in event of an emergency door opening.

One area that perhaps needs to be looked at is the 2-way communication system and PA system on the Networkers. On many of the units the PA system is ridiculously quiet when the train is stationary in a station, and barely audible when units are on the move. I realise the 465/466s are over 20 years old and there's a limit to the fixes but certain parts of these trains are a joke: PA system, toilets, interconnecting doors, loose cushions, loose covers etc. Whether these are down to the build or Southeastern's maintenance regimes I don't know.

 

[455driver]

I suspect it was deliberate that they chose the side where they could not be hit by other trains. Isn't this usually* away from the live rail?

No, there is a 50/50 chance of it being on the cess side.

Actually as its close to a platform ramp I would say there is a 95% chance that the rear unit is sat with the 3rd rail on the cess side. the 3rd rail will change to the 6ft side (away from the platform) about 10ft before the ramp).
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

being surrounded with smoke probably smelling quite awful and certainly causing breathing or choking issues.

If you was inside that carriage what would you do? Stand there and choke or try to get away from the source of the smoke.

Oh please, according to the videos on utube the inside of the train was absolutely clear of smoke with no body choking, not exactly how you descibe but then I am just going by the videos of the actual detrainment filmed by these (alledgedly) choking/coughing passengers that still managed to film the "excitement" despite being so close to death! :roll:

Or were you there/do you have a source that proves they were choking?

edit-
Steve Ford, how many times have you used "I assume" or "presumably" on this thread?
You do not know the passengers were choking (looking at the videos I find it unlikely, alright impossible, for them to be safer on the track than they were on the train) and if it is as I hear it is then the only course of action that would have needed to be done to "protect" the passengers from the danger was to shut the windows.

 

[maniacmartin]

No, there is a 50/50 chance of it being on the cess side.

Actually as its close to a platform ramp I would say there is a 95% chance that the rear unit is sat with the 3rd rail on the cess side. the 3rd rail will change to the 6ft side (away from the platform) about 10ft before the ramp)

Interesting. I didn't know that.

In the video near the very start you can actually hear one passenger telling some others to be careful of live rails.

 

[Mintona]

No Southeastern trains are currently equipped with GSM-R so a push of the big red button wasn't an option.

I don't know the full facts here, although I'm sure I will learn them in time. I would say it's unlikely the driver knew about the fire as he would've been looking the other way. The approach to Hither Green is also on quite a tight bend so be wouldn't have necessarily been able to see anything by looking back. He would have been aware of the loss of interlock and had a passcom alarm sounding; however that doesn't necessarily mean he knew a door was open, as certain faults on networkers also have those 'symptoms', and they have no TMS. I'm certain that at the time of making the announcement about being on the move shortly he had no idea people were disembarking.

As I previously stated, he was just approaching a station that he wasn't booked to stop at. My guess (and it is just a guess) is that he assumed someone pulled the egress as they wanted to get off and had boarded the wrong train. This happens alarmingly regularly on north Kent services. He probably had the intention of going back to reset the egress and continue when he made the announcement; however when he got out to have a look he noticed the commotion so phoned to get the electricity off and line blocked. Also with an egress pushed, the driver gets a passcom alarm sound but has no way of talking to the passenger as he would if it'd been a passcom itself pushed.

As I said, this is all a guess, I have no inside information.

I also think it is difficult to fault what the passengers did in an obviously distressing situation. I know how busy Sidcup line trains can be and there's no way they would have been able to file into other carriages.

 

[ModernRailways]

In the video near the very start you can actually hear one passenger telling some others to be careful of live rails.

I can't seem to find any video. Have you got a direct link?

 

[1e10]

I can't seem to find any video. Have you got a direct link?

There is a short clip on the original DM article but I can't hear anyone warning of the third rail.

 

[Sidious]

I do think that, sad to say, it will only be when there are some people killed who detrained that the message might get through.

De-training onto a track should be an absolute last resort.

THIS news report from France (about 5 years old) shows how dangerous it can be, it was sheer good luck that no one was killed in this incident.

Throwing a live rail into the mix only makes things worse.

 

[JGR]

Had passengers sat there with smoke filling the carriages, it's possible that some could have died/been injured from smoke inhalation or other fire-related issues.
Had passengers disembarked of their own accord, it's possible that some could have died/been injured from the 3rd rail, ground obstacles, passing traffic on the other line, etc.
It is not possible to have always have sufficient quantities of trained staff in the right place at the right time to deal with vanishingly rare, unexpected incidents.

You can't win really.

 

[daikilo]

De-training onto a track should be an absolute last resort.

THIS news report from France (about 5 years old) shows how dangerous it can be, it was sheer good luck that no one was killed in this incident.

Throwing a live rail into the mix only makes things worse.

SNCF Ile de France did a blanket ad campaign aimed at stopping such behaviour and it seems to have been successful so far (though to be fair the word miracle was understood by most rather than good luck).

What I have seen in at least the first video on you-tube is passengers walking towards the smoke. This is the same mentality issue that occured with the SNCF train - let's all get off and follow the lead sheep.

What about a blanket ad campaign where the dangers of 660v are implicit?

It should be possible to link either the trainstop or the egress button to a recorded message that says "do not alight unless you are authorised to do so or that you are sure you are under physical danger. This line is electrified at ground level."

 

[Bald Rick]

There was smoke in one of the carriages. Pretty sure only 3 were off the platform when it stopped but stand corrected if this is wrong.

The power was already off as the fault had tripped it.

In an emergency the power can be switched off in the length of time it takes to make a phone call to the Electrical Control Operator requesting an emergency isolation, 2 mins max.

As has been said Southeastern don't have GSM-R fitted yet (even though the network is commissioned), and pressing the Emergency Call button doesn't cause signals to go red, particularly not automatic ones!

 

[cjohnson]

http://www.southeasternrailway.co.uk/news/latest-news/train-evacuation-at-hither-green/

Train evacuation at Hither Green
Date: 27 Aug 2013

Southeastern has today apologised to all passengers caught up in this morning’s incident at Hither Green.

At approximately 07:56 this morning, smoke was reported underneath the rear four coaches of the 0717 Gravesend to London Charing Cross as it approached Hither Green. Passengers on board the train pulled the emergency alarm and the train came to a stand (stopping the train). The driver contacted the Control and Network Rail switched off the track power and passengers evacuated the train. The London Fire Brigade attended the scene.

The 10 car train was half in the platform, allowing passengers in the front coaches to evacuate through the station, and those in the rear four coaches evacuated onto the track where they were met by staff and escorted through the nearby depot.

There are no reports of any injuries.

Out of interest, what do the safety notices on SE's Networkers tell passengers to do if they encounter smoke/fire on a train?

 

[ModernRailways]

http://www.southeasternrailway.co.uk/news/latest-news/train-evacuation-at-hither-green/

If we believe what SouthEastern say, then it looks like the passengers actually had the all clear from the driver before just jumping out. The driver may have also warned passengers of the live rail and so they took extra care going from that.

We'll never know the actual truth other than the exaggerated witness reports we've already seen in the media and the driver. Will certainly be good to see what the RAIB think of it!

 

[Electrostar]

At the beginning of the video I posted last night a passenger mentions the conductor rail as people evacuate. Around 1m28 into the video the driver can clearly be heard apologising for the late running of the service. The calm passengers who are preparing to evacuate are heard laughing at this announcement in a way that is so terribly British.

For those who missed it http://youtu.be/T2OQEyF9klw

One footnote: from my experience of commuting in London I imagine these passengers will have chatted to each other during the evacuation but once on the move or certainly by today's commute are unlikely to acknowledge each other again. It happened all the time in the mid-90s under Connex and Railtrack - points, signal or train failure always raised a discussion but once on the move you barely acknowledged you'd spoken aside from a "Cheerio" at the destination.

 

[Antman]

That all sounds highly.probable and yes misuse of the alarm is indeed common on North Kent services along with various other forms of anti social behaviour.

No Southeastern trains are currently equipped with GSM-R so a push of the big red button wasn't an option.

I don't know the full facts here, although I'm sure I will learn them in time. I would say it's unlikely the driver knew about the fire as he would've been looking the other way. The approach to Hither Green is also on quite a tight bend so be wouldn't have necessarily been able to see anything by looking back. He would have been aware of the loss of interlock and had a passcom alarm sounding; however that doesn't necessarily mean he knew a door was open, as certain faults on networkers also have those 'symptoms', and they have no TMS. I'm certain that at the time of making the announcement about being on the move shortly he had no idea people were disembarking.

As I previously stated, he was just approaching a station that he wasn't booked to stop at. My guess (and it is just a guess) is that he assumed someone pulled the egress as they wanted to get off and had boarded the wrong train. This happens alarmingly regularly on north Kent services. He probably had the intention of going back to reset the egress and continue when he made the announcement; however when he got out to have a look he noticed the commotion so phoned to get the electricity off and line blocked. Also with an egress pushed, the driver gets a passcom alarm sound but has no way of talking to the passenger as he would if it'd been a passcom itself pushed.

As I said, this is all a guess, I have no inside information.

I also think it is difficult to fault what the passengers did in an obviously distressing situation. I know how busy Sidcup line trains can be and there's no way they would have been able to file into other carriages.

--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

http://www.southeasternrailway.co.uk/news/latest-news/train-evacuation-at-hither-green/



Out of interest, what do the safety notices on SE's Networkers tell passengers to do if they encounter smoke/fire on a train?

Does anybody read such notices? You cannot plan for every eventuality

 

[Minstral25]

Oh please, according to the videos on utube the inside of the train was absolutely clear of smoke with no body choking, not exactly how you descibe but then I am just going by the videos of the actual detrainment filmed by these (alledgedly) choking/coughing passengers that still managed to film the "excitement" despite being so close to death! :roll:

Or were you there/do you have a source that proves they were choking?

The only Video's I had found had shown the view from adjacent carriages. In any case the video just posted by Electrostar clearly shows that it was an organised disembarkation where the doors were not forced open but opened by the train staff. This clearly puts a different spin on the whole story.

It is your view that in a train fire where passengers are surrounded by smoke have no idea what is happening they should stay where they are, even if this means smoke inhalation, rather than get onto the track level and away from the fire to hopeful safety. If there was smoke coming from under your car would you get out or stay there hoping it would be alright in a minute?

Passengers are not sheep and they are paying hard earned money to be packed into that train to get to work. They do not deserve to be treated with such contempt by a railway employee.

 

[ModernRailways]

At the beginning of the video I posted last night a passenger mentions the conductor rail as people evacuate. Around 1m28 into the video the driver can clearly be heard apologising for the late running of the service. The calm passengers who are preparing to evacuate are heard laughing at this announcement in a way that is so terribly British.

So does this mean the driver was unaware? Maybe there was a fault with the wiring which may have been affected by the loss of power which also meant he wasn't aware the doors were open. The wires for the PA however weren't affected and so they remained working, albeit poorly.

One thing that really struck me though is how people are just jumping from the train to the ground, which in itself is unsafe. Ballast could easily slip away from under your feet as you jump, anyone with sense surely would sit down on the step and then jump down from there which is a much safer way.

Another thing, was how people cared more about their phones. In one of the videos a woman is helping another person out of the train whilst talking on her phone!

The sheep mentality of people though is something which can't be helped. Once one person has done it, others will follow, then the whole train decides too. Obviously, it would be (possibly, depending on what the problem was) best to remain on the train, but would you want to be the only person still on the train when everyone else has got off, I know I wouldn't regardless of the situation. Almost all other passengers will no doubt have the same mentality, which is why you see it en masse because everybody follows because they think it's alright.

 

[BestWestern]

http://www.southeasternrailway.co.uk/news/latest-news/train-evacuation-at-hither-green/

If we believe what SouthEastern say, then it looks like the passengers actually had the all clear from the driver before just jumping out. The driver may have also warned passengers of the live rail and so they took extra care going from that.

We'll never know the actual truth other than the exaggerated witness reports we've already seen in the media and the driver. Will certainly be good to see what the RAIB think of it!

It certainly seems, from video evidence mentioned elsewhere, that the detraining passengers had no form of permission or approval from the Driver, who we can presume had no idea that this was happening as he was still making initial "Sorry for the delay" announcements while the punters were going trackside.

Southeastern will issue a statement toning down the dangerous elements of what took place, they are highly unlikely to openly admit that what took place was chaos and potentially life threatening.

 

[455driver]

It is your view that in a train fire where passengers are surrounded by smoke have no idea what is happening they should stay where they are, even if this means smoke inhalation, rather than get onto the track level and away from the fire to hopeful safety. If there was smoke coming from under your car would you get out or stay there hoping it would be alright in a minute?#

So you are proposong that when the carriage on fire and surrounded by smoke it is better to force the doors open and jump out into that smoke!
Good luck with that, me I would be heading to an ajoining carriage, and believe me if the carriage I am in is on fire I will get into that carriage!

Passengers are not sheep and they are paying hard earned money to be packed into that train to get to work. They do not deserve to be treated with such contempt by a railway employee.

A lot of them are sheep though, they will blindly follow anyone that sounds as if they know what they are talking about.

Again I ask to those defending the self evacuation route-
Where is the smoke that is supposed to be inside the carriage?
I cant see any!

 

[BestWestern]

The power was already off as the fault had tripped it.

In an emergency the power can be switched off in the length of time it takes to make a phone call to the Electrical Control Operator requesting an emergency isolation, 2 mins max.

Yes, but not a great many passengers are likely to making that call! And bearing in mind he seemingly hadn't realised his pax were detraining, neither was the Driver by the looks of things.

 

[cjohnson]

http://www.southeasternrailway.co.uk/news/latest-news/train-evacuation-at-hither-green/



Out of interest, what do the safety notices on SE's Networkers tell passengers to do if they encounter smoke/fire on a train?

Does anybody read such notices? You cannot plan for every eventuality

I guess my question was, if the notices on board say something along the lines of "If you see fire/smoke, move along to the next carriage as soon as possible" and the passengers are unable to do so (due to the next carriage being full and standing, or it being the end of a unit) is it unreasonable to criticise them for then attempting to leave the train instead?

 

[Antman]

The only Video's I had found had shown the view from adjacent carriages. In any case the video just posted by Electrostar clearly shows that it was an organised disembarkation where the doors were not forced open but opened by the train staff. This clearly puts a different spin on the whole story.

It is your view that in a train fire where passengers are surrounded by smoke have no idea what is happening they should stay where they are, even if this means smoke inhalation, rather than get onto the track level and away from the fire to hopeful safety. If there was smoke coming from under your car would you get out or stay there hoping it would be alright in a minute?

Passengers are not sheep and they are paying hard earned money to be packed into that train to get to work. They do not deserve to be treated with such contempt by a railway employee.

I suspect passengers used the emergency door release, otherwise I very much agree with what you've said.

If a building/car/train/whatever is on fire the best bet is to get the hell out and ask questions later

 

[ModernRailways]

So you are proposong that when the carriage on fire and surrounded by smoke it is better to force the doors open and jump out into that smoke!
Good luck with that, me I would be heading to an ajoining carriage, and believe me if the carriage I am in is on fire I will get into that carriage!

I know I would get off the train and as far away as possible. I wouldn't just be moving to another carriage if there was some sort of fire!

I've been on SouthEastern from Penge East to Victoria in the AM peak and there was no way I was getting on. People were crammed all the way down the carriages. You have to remember there is a carriage worth of people, and if everyone pushes down to the other two carriages either side you will end up with people being crushed. What should happen in that instance is people at other carriages leave and then everyone moves away from the carriage on fire whilst also leaving the train once they move up - a bit like how London Underground do it, where everyone moves up the train to the drivers cab and exits through the cab door(s) only instead you would be leaving via the front passenger doors and possibly cab with the cab providing more safety for elderly/disabled passengers.

A lot of them are sheep though, they will blindly follow anyone that sounds as if they know what they are talking about.

Again I ask to those defending the self evacuation route-
Where is the smoke that is supposed to be inside the carriage?
I cant see any!

This isn't the carriage with the smoking undercarriage. If you see smoke billowing out from underneath the train what would your natural reaction be? I know I would certainly want to be out of there regardless of whether it was inside the carriage or not.

 

[455driver]

If you are not in the actual carriage that is smoking/on fire then you are not in any immediate danger so there is no need to evacuate, ergo you are a sheep!

 

[ModernRailways]

If you are not in the actual carriage that is smoking/on fire then you are not in any immediate danger so there is no need to evacuate, ergo you are a sheep!

And how can you be sure of that? It all depends on what has actually happened to cause the smoke/fire.

Like I said, there is also the fact that people can become so crammed in that that would be dangerous in itself. These Peak time trains don't just have this extra space unless people really started moving down and all passengers stood and that wouldn't happen.

Try convincing the general public that a train can't explode, try convincing them that even if there is smoke/fire to just move to the next carriage and you will be fine... We'll still continue with the dangerous carriage!

 

[Electrostar]

I don't recall Southeastern (or previous franchisees) having safety notices. Looking around the train now I can see advertisements and posters warning of fare evasion, CCTV and smoking fines but none indicating what to do in an emergency. Hang on, there are some notices on the doors on how to open manually. I'm sure they give some indication of when or when it's not appropriate to evacuate but I'm too far away to read them.

But as for the large illustrations you see on many operators' trains (you know, the 3D representations of the unit you're aboard, often in neutral white) they've never been a feature of Networkers as far as I'm aware.

 

[jon0844]

Surely they are there somewhere? I thought it was now a legal requirement, including the driver (or the PIS) telling people to read the safety notices, before the train starts off from its point of origin.

In the case of FCC GN, it does the announcement on a 317 at King's Cross and shortly after leaving Finsbury Park.

I can't say I've been on a train without seeing posters somewhere, or in the case of some TOCs, on leaflets in seat pockets.

I'd like to say you could put them on seat backs, but clearly they'd get drawn on and torn off in no time. Especially on a SouthEastern service!

 

[Electrostar]

I got off the train at the last stop, so I couldn't see the small notices on the door as the doors were open. I certainly don't recall ever seeing the type of evacuation diagrams on Networkers that you see on many other trains.

 

[Silv1983]

Another day, another whisp of smoke causing chaos..

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-23882226

 

[jon0844]

Another day, another whisp of smoke causing chaos..

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-23882226

She added people were pressing the emergency buttons but nothing happened.

Surely most alarms are silent these days? What was she expecting, a siren and then all the lights going red saying 'WARNING! RED ALERT!'?

 

[Silv1983]

Perhaps she'd thought a robotic uber-being would emerge from a concealed chamber behind the wall and rip the doors clean off the side of the train.