"The Sun" retracts statement regarding Paddington derailment

[district]

The Sun newspaper has been forced to publish a retractment of a statement they published about the rail derailment at Paddington recently, where they said a driver, having observed Ramadan, went through "two red lights".

In a story ‘Ramadan Train Driver in Crash’ (20 Aug) we implied that Rail Accident Investigation Branch said the cause of the derailment at Paddington was that the driver had been fasting during Ramadan. In fact they were unable to conclude that fasting was a factor in the crash on evidence available, although they observed that there is research showing that fasting can affect people’s concentration levels. It was also stated that the driver of a derailed train ran through TWO red lights at London’s Paddington Station. In fact the two red lights were on the same signal. We are happy to clarify.

More detail on the RAIB site here.

 

[AlterEgo]

Good spot. I bet the retraction was printed in teeny tiny writing.

 

[DarloRich]

Good spot. I bet the retraction was printed in teeny tiny writing.

on the foot of page 27

 

[AlterEgo]

on the foot of page 27

I hope you haven't been reading it!

 

[DarloRich]

I hope you haven't been reading it!

call it an educated guess - id rather read used toilet paper than the Sun.

 

[Qwerty133]

The thing is what the Sun posted is probably at least somewhat accurate, the investigators clearly saw a possible link between fasting and the crash or it wouldn't even have been mentioned that the driver was fasting.

 

[Simon11]

I recently signed up to a petition, to make it a legal requirement for papers to print corrections at same size as errors.

Still plenty more votes required, but it would be good for papers to take action and carefully review what they print, rather than show incorrect facts.

https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/170232

 

[Kite159]

on the foot of page 27

Underneath some adverts no doubt

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

Let me prick this effusive bubble of self-congratulatory justification by asking if a red light was actually passed in the said incident...or not.

 

[ac6000cw]

Let me prick this effusive bubble of self-congratulatory justification by asking if a red light was actually passed in the said incident...or not.

It was (https://www.gov.uk/government/publi...-digest/derailment-at-paddington-16-june-2016) - technically the double red lights of a position-light ground signal, so in simplistic terms the Sun's description was not incorrect - even if (I assume) they meant to imply the train ran past two separate 'red' signals in succession.

To quote from the RAIB report - "Signal SN6004 was clearly visible, but the driver did not realise that it applied to his train, so he drove past it although it was showing two red lights, meaning ‘Stop’."

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

It was (https://www.gov.uk/government/publi...-digest/derailment-at-paddington-16-june-2016) - technically the double red lights of a position-light ground signal, so in simplistic terms the Sun's description was not incorrect - even if (I assume) they meant to imply the train ran past two separate 'red' signals in succession.

To quote from the RAIB report - "Signal SN6004 was clearly visible, but the driver did not realise that it applied to his train, so he drove past it although it was showing two red lights, meaning ‘Stop’."

Would the route knowledge of the driver in question be one that he should have had knowledge of the requirements of signal SN6004?

 

[Groningen]

So on page 27; most readers would already have thrown the paper away.