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Derailment at Kirkby (Merseyside) - 13/03/2021

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Vespa

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Indeed ! In one Twitter post BTP from a different part of the country questioned if it was given permission to be shown and to contact them to verify.
 
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Bikeman78

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Bletchleyite said:
Intriguing on those photos that the unit is shown with one door leaf closed. A fault, or for a reason, I wonder?
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Some New York subway cars do that. One leaf of the two end doors on each car can be left open whilst all others are shut. Very useful at open air termini in cold weather.
 
RichSwitch

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Some of the sparks at the front would be the effect of metal wheels on metal rails I’d think? There looks to have been quite a bit of momentum that would need to be dissipated somehow by various parts of the underneath contacting with various parts of the infrastructure.

It certainly makes for sobering viewing.
 
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Taunton

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One wonders at all the concern shown in an incident where the train has absorbed very well a substantial collision and only has an inconvenient recovery. Despite all the "what if" doom-mongers, nobody is (as usual) apparently hurt.

In London, on the buses, in one year, 2019, there were 11 fatalities involving buses. If that sort of statistic occurred on the railway one gets the impression that the whole lot would be shut down. This train seems to have some notable body damage, to the front vehicle. Mainstream bus operators actually maintain their own body shops for dealing with collision damage, which for them is a regular and predictable thing.

Why the different approach?

Here are the London statistics : http://content.tfl.gov.uk/casualties-in-greater-london-2019.pdf
 
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Bletchleyite

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Inversnecky said:
Someone used their phone to record a web video, by the looks of it.
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They did, but the thing in question is that it was recorded from CCTV playback, i.e. a member of staff did it. I suspect that that member of staff is not likely to have a job for much longer as there won't be many people who would have had the access to do that.

There's nowhere you could stand to directly film that perspective on your phone, even trespassing - that's clear to see from Google Maps.
 
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racyrich

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Taunton said:
One wonders at all the concern shown in an incident where the train has absorbed very well a substantial collision and only has an inconvenient recovery. Despite all the "what if" doom-mongers, nobody is (as usual) apparently hurt.

In London, on the buses, in one year, 2019, there were 11 fatalities involving buses. If that sort of statistic occurred on the railway one gets the impression that the whole lot would be shut down. This train seems to have some notable body damage, to the front vehicle. Mainstream bus operators actually maintain their own body shops for dealing with collision damage, which for them is a regular and predictable thing.

Why the different approach?

Here are the London statistics : http://content.tfl.gov.uk/casualties-in-greater-london-2019.pdf
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A bit misleading. It also says

Unfortunately in 2019 one bus passenger was fatally injured whilst attempting to board a bus, and one bus driver was killed in a road collision.

Which is not that different from the railways. The other 9 deaths being innocent pedestrians. At least the railways don't tend to kill too many non-suicidal people.
 
Mcr Warrior

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Taunton said:
One wonders at all the concern shown in an incident where the train has absorbed very well a substantial collision and only has an inconvenient recovery. Despite all the "what if" doom-mongers, nobody is (as usual) apparently hurt.

Why the different approach?
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Some good points...

Possible explanations...

This is a rail forum. We are interested in rail related news.

What happened was also somewhat unusual, it's thankfully not every day on the UK rail network that a service train ploughs through buffer stops at maybe 30 mph.

And, as you also mentioned, no one got badly hurt, so perhaps not inappropriate / disrespectful to comment on this particular incident as would undoubtedly have been the case if someone had been injured, or worse.
 
bramling

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Taunton said:
One wonders at all the concern shown in an incident where the train has absorbed very well a substantial collision and only has an inconvenient recovery. Despite all the "what if" doom-mongers, nobody is (as usual) apparently hurt.

In London, on the buses, in one year, 2019, there were 11 fatalities involving buses. If that sort of statistic occurred on the railway one gets the impression that the whole lot would be shut down. This train seems to have some notable body damage, to the front vehicle. Mainstream bus operators actually maintain their own body shops for dealing with collision damage, which for them is a regular and predictable thing.

Why the different approach?

Here are the London statistics : http://content.tfl.gov.uk/casualties-in-greater-london-2019.pdf
Click to expand...

Whilst the same could be applied to buses, the thing with the “what if?” scenario is that eventually near misses will produce an accident where there’s the potential for a significant number of fatalities. Indeed the Carmont derailment last year could easily have been that had the train been more heavily loaded. Likewise Watford Tunnel.

I’m realistic enough to take the view that accidents and near misses will occasionally happen no matter how strong the safety culture, however we shouldn’t be complacent.
 
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WatcherZero

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Those GLA statistics are surprisingly comprehensive...

5 cyclists killed and 2 people killed by cyclists
2 people died on buses (one driver, one while boarding) 12 after being hit by them.

In the same year according to ORR
London Underground 5 passenger deaths, 1 worker death (died while repairing a travellator)
Nationally there were 7 rail passenger deaths (doesnt break down where they occurred) six were people falling off platform edges and one was a violent assault.

Non rail passenger deaths on the rail network 283 suicides, 17 trespass deaths, 2 on level crossings, 1 fell from a bridge and was hit by a train and 1 electrocution.

Rail Safety 2019-20 (orr.gov.uk)
 
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yorkie

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If anyone wishes to discuss anything other than the derailment at Kirkby ( such as comparisons of road vs rail accidents), please create a new thread (if there isn't one already), thanks :)

Edit: There is a thread to discuss the rescue operation here:

507 unit rescue operation at Kirkby following the derailment

Footage released by Network Rail of the recovery (via RAIL magazine) https://facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=3921287521297374&id=171809916245172&anchor_composer=false Footage released by Network Rail showing ROG 37800 rescuing Merseyrail 507006 at Kirkby following last weekend's accident.
www.railforums.co.uk
 
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scrapy

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Technically the buffer stop is a red signal. There is also likely to be work required to track circuits/axle counters even if just to reset them.(sorry I'm not familiar with signalling type used on Kirkby line).
 
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plugwash

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scrapy said:
Technically the buffer stop is a red signal. There is also likely to be work required to track circuits/axle counters even if just to reset them
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I'd have thought that given that the train seems to have been pulled out on it's own wheels (not with skates or similar) that an axle counter would have correctly counted it out (unless it got reset somehow during the process).

And I don't think a track circuit has a concept of being "reset", it just detects whether or not the rails are shorted at a given time.
 
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Bald Rick

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plugwash said:
And I don't think a track circuit has a concept of being "reset", it just detects whether or not the rails are shorted at a given time.
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Some buffer stops (and a few siding lines) have something called a “Track Circuit Interrupter” which is failsafe device that (effectively) permanently disconnects the track circuit in the event that something overruns the buffers. In the event it is activated, it has to be replaced and retested before the track circuit will show clear again. I don’t know if Kirkby had this arrangement.
 
QueensCurve

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Interestingly it is a like for like replacement when the history implies that some improvement might be needed.
 
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Ianno87

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Dai Corner said:
"Repairing the signals"?
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Bald Rick said:
The buffer stop is technically signal.
Click to expand...

Bald Rick said:
Some buffer stops (and a few siding lines) have something called a “Track Circuit Interrupter” which is failsafe device that (effectively) permanently disconnects the track circuit in the event that something overruns the buffers. In the event it is activated, it has to be replaced and retested before the track circuit will show clear again. I don’t know if Kirkby had this arrangement.
Click to expand...

Presumably a TPWS grid (or similar) may have been damaged as the train derailed?
 
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Vespa

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Laying the tracks straightforward enough, repairing and aligning the platform edge to the train and signalling will take a while.
 
507 001

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It's on Merseyrail's twitter that they hope to reopen the line on Monday (22nd March).
Track repair work at Kirkby station is progressing well and will continue throughout the weekend. We are hopeful that Kirkby line services will resume from start of service Monday 22 March and a full update will be provided on Sunday afternoon.
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