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

[pt_mad]

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

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.

To be fair it was on the front of the Metro at the start of the week. The main story. About a TOC cancelling services before any snow has fallen. And now we see it was justified.

With today's compensation culture there is always a hunt for blame. Someone trips on an uneven curb stone in a country village and it's the council's fault. Not everything can be perfect or run perfectly and nobody can expect it to.

There was a clip played on BBC news yesterday throughout the day of a car going very slowly but that was skidding and sliding into the other side of the road on some trunk road. It came to a stop on the wrong side and there's a bus seen coming towards it looks like it can't brake and suddenly at the last minute or slides past to avoid the car narrowly.
Made me wonder in a situation like that if there was an accident, would there be a hunt for blame or would it simply be put down to the weather? I mean it's not dangerous driving or without due care and attention as as long as you are giving it fill attention what else can you do? And of the road is open surely that means the authorities deem it to be safe to attempt it?
If a road were not gritted and someone had an accident I wonder whether the council would take the rap.

 

[1018509]

Just seen what I assume was a Thunderbird pass and then a Voyager creeping towards Sway on the up.

Nothing else moving in New Milton no buses or cars even the not too steep slope in our road is impassable. It's not snow it's the overnight freezing rain causing the problem.

 

[lejog]

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.

According to the passenger interviewed live on R4 just after 7.30am, passengers on the 17.05 from Waterloo were then being evacuated to another train.

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

No heating overnight.

 

[1018509]

If the above loco I mentioned was on thunderbird duties does it show in RealTime Trains as I can't see it or any reference toa single loco at about that time.

 

[dorsetdesiro]

Sympathies to the passengers stuck overnight without food & warmth at least they are being rescued and hopefully they will get compensation of some sort.

Yesterday's snowfall must be pretty bad for a class 444 train to fail, it could be considered robust enough to get through as seen in this video this 444 was struggling in the snow though it still managed to keep moving.

 

[Llanigraham]

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.

Exactly how do you think they could have done something?
And why would the RAIB be involved?

 

[greaterwest]

Both trains in question were 444s. In the end, CrossCountry's 1O24 reversed to Totton to cross over, and go "down" the "up" line to rescue the 150 odd passengers on both stranded units. I'm surprised it took them that long to decide to do that. I found some photos on Twitter, people seemed to be making their own arrangements on board the train;

https://twitter.com/dsamanthaj/status/969370802851368961

 

[theironroad]

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.....

The first train trapped eventually moved hours late around midnight and then it allowed the xc trapped behind to enter Bournemouth. It then ran ECS to Eastleigh as up line not blocked.

While not easy, this unit could have rescued passengers from down line train and then transported them wrong road back to Bournemouth.

However it would require co-operation between swr and xc and the availability of a xc train manager which could be problematic.

As you know it requires people in Basingstoke to make some decisions. It's annoying when the rule book/toc instructions makes so many degraded workings possible but they are not implemented.

 

[pt_mad]

Wow I'm surprised the overhead rack could hold a person.

 

[theironroad]

Both trains in question were 444s. In the end, CrossCountry's 1O24 reversed to Totton to cross over, and go "down" the "up" line to rescue the 150 odd passengers on both stranded units. I'm surprised it took them that long to decide to do that. I found some photos on Twitter, people seemed to be making their own arrangements on board the train;

https://twitter.com/dsamanthaj/status/969370802851368961

What time did this happen? I assume this was the xc unit that was held at ashurst for ages but had no trains behind it.

 

[theironroad]

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.

I don't know about buses, but airlines and airports do come in for equally harsh venom and criticism when they melt down, especially about airlines not providing information or abandoning passengers stranded at airports.

 

[greaterwest]

What time did this happen? I assume this was the xc unit that was held at ashurst for ages but had no trains behind it.

I'm not 100% sure, I think some time early this morning. It was indeed 1O24, the trapped Bournemouth train that spent hours at Ashurst New Forest.

 

[pt_mad]

I don't know about buses, but airlines and airports do come in for equally harsh venom and criticism when they melt down, especially about airlines not providing information or abandoning passengers stranded at airports.

One of the airport's was featured on BBC news yesterday morning. They said 200 passengers had to stay in the airport overnight which I thought seemed quite low considering and many must have sensibly stayed away. Can't remember which airport but think it may have been one of the ones in Southern Scotland.

 

[Bletchleyite]

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

And for those who say it doesn't happen abroad...didn't exactly the same thing happen in Japan a couple of months ago?

This is probably just one of those things. I have quite a strong view on failing to act quickly enough in normal circumstances, but these circumstances were not normal.

Edit: at least it was quiet - wasn't the Japanese one full and standing?

 

[Bletchleyite]

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

I'd rather be on a train in those conditions, even one with no heating, than walking through the bleak New Forest with unsuitable footwear.

Bet the bogs were "pleasant" without power though. No doubt any empty bottles put to good use

 

[w0033944]

From the viewpoint of spmeone who is interested in meteorology, I was aware of freezing rain warnings in that area earlier yesterday. Given that this information was widely-available, it seem strange to me that TOCs on third-rail lines (which are vulnerable to the effects of freezing rain) wouldn't have taken the precaution of cancelling servces.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Wow I'm surprised the overhead rack could hold a person.

I've seen that a few times, they're quite strong.

 

[pt_mad]

I've seen that a few times, they're quite strong.

I spose it makes sense .if you had four cases weighting 20 kilos each it's practically the same as a person.

 

[bb21]

As you know it requires people in Basingstoke to make some decisions.

You know what people at Basingstoke did, how? Please elaborate.

Baseless comments like this are irresponsible. Basingstoke have been completely overloaded recently but must it be because they couldn't make a decision?

Yes, they make mistakes, but to imply they didn't even try hard enough last night is completely nonsense if you can even glance into the control log.

 

[Dougal2345]

I can see through the window in the second picture that they are at a station - is it Beaulieu Road, not sure? Could they not have hopped off and woken up the landlord of the pub there?

 

[greaterwest]

I can see through the window in the second picture that they are at a station - is it Beaulieu Road, not sure? Could they not have hopped off and woken up the landlord of the pub there?

Looks like it was Brockenhurst.

 

[Ash Bridge]

Wow I'm surprised the overhead rack could hold a person.

Hope he didn't roll over in his slumber though, that's quite some drop....ouch!!

 

[Bromley boy]

From the viewpoint of spmeone who is interested in meteorology, I was aware of freezing rain warnings in that area earlier yesterday. Given that this information was widely-available, it seem strange to me that TOCs on third-rail lines (which are vulnerable to the effects of freezing rain) wouldn't have taken the precaution of cancelling servces.

I believe that was the case over much of the south east, it was certainly forecast last night at Gatwick (and indeed still is), so reacting in that way would probably have meant cancelling virtually every train in the region.

 

[Antman]

From the viewpoint of spmeone who is interested in meteorology, I was aware of freezing rain warnings in that area earlier yesterday. Given that this information was widely-available, it seem strange to me that TOCs on third-rail lines (which are vulnerable to the effects of freezing rain) wouldn't have taken the precaution of cancelling servces.

It's a no win situation, cancel services and there will be criticism, run them and you risk something like this. I don't see a solution quite honestly.

 

[bb21]

Well, people who got into work in the morning would need transporting back home, so cancelling all services is not really an option.

 

[Antman]

And for those who say it doesn't happen abroad...didn't exactly the same thing happen in Japan a couple of months ago?

This is probably just one of those things. I have quite a strong view on failing to act quickly enough in normal circumstances, but these circumstances were not normal.

Edit: at least it was quiet - wasn't the Japanese one full and standing?

Exactly, makes me laugh people who think things like this (roads and rail) only happen in the UK.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Presumably if it was in a station passengers wishing to get off would have been allowed to do so, that is certainly usual practice. So those remaining simply had nowhere suitable and safe to go, which in the conditions is not surprising.

I've sat on a train at Hemel Hempsted for 2 hours before when most others had got off. I didn't have a more sensible option, so I got my laptop out, grabbed a table and worked from there. If there'd been a buffet service for a coffee it would have been a perfectly decent office.

 

[bb21]

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?

Possibly, provided that they are available, and the location accessible. Don't forget that they were out last night helping on the A31, and deep in the New Forest is not one of the easier places to get to, even with a tanker.

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

Wouldn't be overly busy after Southampton unless there is a big event.

 

[700007]

I would like to apologise for the post I wrote earlier on. After doing more research, which I should have done before publishing that, I have gotten my facts wrong and wrongly conveyed this. I'm incredibly sorry for any offence or distress caused. I was expressing my concern over 150-200 passengers (from what I've now read) being stranded on a train for 15 hours with no food, water or toilet but did not understand the severity of the snow and how stretched emergency services were and that recovery was for obvious reasons very difficult.

Once again I'm incredibly sorry to everybody on here and I will try not to make an assumption like that again.

 

[bb21]

Part and parcel of a discussion about a big incident. No harm done. We can't all know everything.