Passengers stuck on trains overnight in New Forest (01/03 - 02/03)

[Antman]

Reports of people being stuck overnight on a train near Christchurch having left Waterloo at 17.00 yesterday.

 

[nlogax]

Reports of people being stuck overnight on a train near Christchurch having left Waterloo at 17.00 yesterday.

Guy being interviewed on R4 now, they've been on the train for approaching fifteen hours and are finally about to be taken off it to another service heading eastbound

 

[oversteer]

Looks like this one:
http://www.realtimetrains.co.uk/train/W91151/2018/03/01/advanced

Been stuck near New Milton since 9pm, ouch!

 

[embers25]

Looks like this one:
http://www.realtimetrains.co.uk/train/W91151/2018/03/01/advanced

Been stuck near New Milton since 9pm, ouch!

Or http://www.realtimetrains.co.uk/train/W91225/2018/03/01/advanced

 

[bb21]

More than one train was stranded in the New Forest last night, unfortunately, both from SWR and XC.

No bus could be sourced, road conditions are most treacherous once you get beyond Mudeford area until Totton side. There also appears to have little in the way of police or fire service available last night due to other serious incidents in the region.

 

[pompeyfan]

Eventually the decision was take to reverse the XC train back to Totton, and run it wrong line to collect the passengers, all passengers finally on the move as of 10 minutes ago. Makes you wonder why the decision wasn’t taken earlier.....

 

[gwr4090]

The BBC is reporting this morning that passengers on Thursday 1 March 17:05 Waterloo to Weymouth have been marooned overnight near Christchurch Dorset. The train is apparently "welded" to the rail and has not moved for many hours. No power, no heating, no lights - it doesn't sound too good ?

 

[neonison]

RTT shows this 412 minutes late departure from New Milton at 0145 but No Report thereafter except for an erroneous 0001 arrival at Bournemouth.

 

[bb21]

Eventually the decision was take to reverse the XC train back to Totton, and run it wrong line to collect the passengers, all passengers finally on the move as of 10 minutes ago. Makes you wonder why the decision wasn’t taken earlier.....

I think it was trapped.

From the sound of things, they certainly were busy trying to sort it out last night. Having 200+ passengers (possibly more) stranded overnight certainly isn't what I would be looking forward to if I were control last night. Only problem is that there were very few resources around and the New Forest is certainly one of the worst places to be stuck.

 

[700007]

SWR Twitter desk is claiming that the train has since started moving slowly. Understandably a lot of passengers are in a distressed state at the moment with lack of updates on the situation. Despite the poor weather, surely more efforts should have been made to recover the passengers in what is now a serious incident? I imagine RAIB are at the ready to bite into them shortly.

 

[bb21]

You can only recover things when resources are available. Last night police, ambulance, and fire services in the region were all stretched to the limit. Many roads in the New Forest were unpassable. The rescue unit also failed.

They were certainly busy last night. There were multiple attempts to source buses and taxis last night but there simply weren't any available or any driver willing to go there.

In addition, AIUI, "lack of updates" is also incorrect. I understand that passengers were kept informed of whatever information traincrew got hold of.

 

[theageofthetra]

SWR Twitter desk is claiming that the train has since started moving slowly. Understandably a lot of passengers are in a distressed state at the moment with lack of updates on the situation. Despite the poor weather, surely more efforts should have been made to recover the passengers in what is now a serious incident? I imagine RAIB are at the ready to bite into them shortly.

I hope so.

 

[Wirewiper]

Understandably a lot of passengers are in a distressed state at the moment with lack of updates on the situation. Despite the poor weather, surely more efforts should have been made to recover the passengers in what is now a serious incident?

People were also stranded on the A31 for many hours. BBC News last night reported that it was being treated as a "major incident".

Whatever happened to stoicism, anyway?

 

[Bellbell]

SWR Twitter desk is claiming that the train has since started moving slowly. Understandably a lot of passengers are in a distressed state at the moment with lack of updates on the situation. Despite the poor weather, surely more efforts should have been made to recover the passengers in what is now a serious incident? I imagine RAIB are at the ready to bite into them shortly.

You can see why, given posts like these, TOCs are conservative about the services they run when the weather forecast is as it has been for the last few days. There's been plenty of criticism in other threads about TOCs cancelling services that, in the eyes of the poster, didn't need to be cancelled. Then, we have posts like this one where TOCs are criticised for not being able to do what the actual emergency services themselves couldn't do, and rescue people from inaccessible locations. People have been trapped on roads too. Why is it so hard to understand that there may genuinely have been nothing the TOC could do to rescue those people last night? Hopefully they were all making essential journeys but nonetheless, advice in most places was to avoid travel...

 

[TT-ONR-NRN]

I hope for their sake it was a 444 they were stuck on and not a 450!

 

[bb21]

I hope for their sake it was a 444 they were stuck on and not a 450!

A 450 would actually be much better due to the lack of arm rests and the ability to lie down across the "3" side for anyone needing a kip.

 

[TT-ONR-NRN]

A 450 would actually be much better due to the lack of arm rests and the ability to lie down across the "3" side.

Not if it was busy though. Surely this is a rush hour service?

 

[Ash Bridge]

The Railways always seem to be the whipping boy in these situations, you never seem to get the same level of criticism, venom or hate fired at bus companies or aircraft operators even though they have also cancelled many services.

Re above posts, from the pictures shown on the BBC earlier it did appear to be a 444.

 

[Antman]

>>> Understandably a lot of passengers are in a distressed state at the moment with lack of updates on the situation. Despite the poor weather, surely more efforts should have been made to recover the passengers in what is now a serious incident? <<<

People were also stranded on the A31 for many hours. BBC News last night reported that it was being treated as a "major incident".

Whatever happened to stoicism, anyway?

Stoicism? Easy saying that when you're not there.

 

[Antman]

The Railways always seem to be the whipping boy in these situations, you never seem to get the same level of criticism, venom or hate fired at bus companies or aircraft operators even though they have also cancelled many services.

In fairness I haven't heard anybody blaming the railway industry for this incident.

 

[TT-ONR-NRN]

In fairness I haven't heard anybody blaming the railway industry for this incident.

Indeed no, who you want to blame is the Beast From The East

 

[pt_mad]

The Railways always seem to be the whipping boy in these situations, you never seem to get the same level of criticism, venom or hate fired at bus companies or aircraft operators even though they have also cancelled many services.

Re above posts, from the pictures shown on the BBC earlier it did appear to be a 444.

Good point. Do they even have delay repay on buses? My experience is that if your bus is cancelled and you're waiting at a stop without screens, you just have to wait for the next one with no recourse or reason. And yet the buses don't seem to get bad press.


Re the treacherous weather. Many of the forecasters advise not to go out unless it's absolutely necessary. However for this to work we need to know whether going to work is absolutely necessary, and whether employers will take an equally understanding view. I know some people can work from home. But for those who can't such as those on a factory line or in a supermarket or whatever else wouldn't be able to.

 

[Ash Bridge]

In fairness I haven't heard anybody blaming the railway industry for this incident.

Well perhaps not yet for this particular incident, but I was speaking generally.

 

[AM9]

In fairness I haven't heard anybody blaming the railway industry for this incident.

But the blame for cancelling services to try and prevent incidents like this occurring all over areas affected by the weather has be from many quarters, - mostly uninformed attention-seeking self-publicists, but there are some from posters here who should know better.

 

[GodAtum]

was there heating? surprised the passengers didnt make their own way off.

 

[Bromley boy]

Despite the poor weather, surely more efforts should have been made to recover the passengers in what is now a serious incident?

I must say this strikes me as a completely unjustified comment. What exactly do you know about the situation to judge whether “more efforts should have been made”.

Interesting you’re now on here criticising SWR when I seem to remember the other days you were criticising another TOC for running fewer trains based on the snow forecast.

I'm still confused why it wasn't until 0721 when the first train started running service (normally 0444) considering the adjacent Greater Anglia was running services from 6 if I am not mistaken. (Surely prove runs don't take that long?)

Since you’re apparently such an expert on railway operations in bad weather maybe you should volunteer your services to network rail as a consultant .

 

[Ash Bridge]

But the blame for cancelling services to try and prevent incidents like this occurring all over areas affected by the weather has be from many quarters, - mostly uninformed attention-seeking self-publicists, but there are some from posters here who should know better.

Exactly, an example the other on the BBC was Simon Calder commenting in somewhat sarcastic tones on Greater Anglia cancellations and making a pointless comparison with the fact that Trans Siberian Express had on the very same day departed on time with no problem whatsoever.

 

[doonaray]

You can only recover things when resources are available. Last night police, ambulance, and fire services in the region were all stretched to the limit. Many roads in the New Forest were unpassable. The rescue unit also failed.

They were certainly busy last night. There were multiple attempts to source buses and taxis last night but there simply weren't any available or any driver willing to go there.

In addition, AIUI, "lack of updates" is also incorrect. I understand that passengers were kept informed of whatever information traincrew got hold of.

Yes understandably resources were stretched to the max, but in a situation like that with no power, no heating etc..... should the council have not maybe called in the military to help with the rescue?

 

[theironroad]

was there heating? surprised the passengers didnt make their own way off.

Media reports suggest that no heating with one guy saying temp felt near freezing. If the trains lost shoe contact then no electrical supply from heating and emergency lights etc will go after battery dies.

Tbh, most roads were blocked, the a31 through the forest had cars trapped overnight with military help requested. Getting off the train in the middle of nowhere in sub zero temps probably not a good idea if you don't know where you are.

 

[BestWestern]

was there heating? surprised the passengers didnt make their own way off.

In the depths of the New Forest, I think it would have been unavoidably obvious to them that being outside really wouldn't have been any better.