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WCML Derailment in Cumbria - 29th May 2024

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185

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Route knowledge would prevent this

It only takes one or two Voyagers a week to be diagrammed over the diversionary route. At least one depot should keep S&C on their cards - perhaps those with the lowest miles on their route card.
 
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The Planner

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It only takes one or two Voyagers a week to be diagrammed over the diversionary route. At least one depot should keep S&C on their cards - perhaps those with the lowest miles on their route card.
No Voyagers soon to do it, and not enough 805s.
 

rower40

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Last night's sleepers appear to be, erm, a bit disrupted. The Up Highland Sleeper 1M16 is currently 292 mins late, and hasn't yet reached the M25 (as I write at 1213 hrs) for a booked 0800 arrival in Euston.
 

Lucy1501

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Having been watching the progress of the single line working, it strikes me as to how they’ve made the section from Penrith to Tebay, rather than making use of the emergency ground frames at Clifton & Lowther and the points at Shap Summit. In fact, the trailing crossover at Harrison’s Sidings could be used in lieu of Clifton & Lowther (albeit requiring a reverse).

Carlisle is one of the few boxes left with a relative abundance of trailing and emergency crossovers - I’m surprised they’re not being used to their fullest potential. It could dramatically improve throughput at the moment!
 

rower40

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Possibly related to Edwin's comment yesterday about staff being less familiar with unexpected/unusual occurrences; there could be a scarcity of MOMs trained to operate those crossovers.
 

WAB

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Possibly related to Edwin's comment yesterday about staff being less familiar with unexpected/unusual occurrences; there could be a scarcity of MOMs trained to operate those crossovers.
A scarcity of MOMs full stop, I suspect...

I can just imagine what some of the old hands would say about the reliance on MOMs for everything, rather than the old system of also having some supervisors and managers passed out for various operational activities.
 

Amlag

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It only takes one or two Voyagers a week to be diagrammed over the diversionary route. At least one depot should keep S&C on their cards - perhaps those with the lowest miles on their route card.

One of the reasons for not closing the S&C back in the 70‘s/80’s was its usefulness for diverting trains off the West Coast when there was planned and emergency line closures between Preston and Carlisle.

Regrettably the policy has now been for several years not to divert passenger trains but to instead Bustitute passengers: although Bustitution is stated by the Rail Business to be a last resort.

Many £ millions was spent relaying almost the whole of the double line S&C for passenger and freight traffic, yet all the coal traffic subsequently ceased and the line now has far, far fewer trains that don‘t justify the whole line being kept as a double line railway.
 

Bletchleyite

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Regrettably the policy has now been for several years not to divert passenger trains but to instead Bustitute passengers: although Bustitution is stated by the Rail Business to be a last resort.

Avanti's policy now seems to be more like "at the slightest hint of trouble declare Do Not Travel and run nothing north of Preston, leaving TPE to pick up the pieces". It really is shoddy in the extreme.
 

The Planner

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Having been watching the progress of the single line working, it strikes me as to how they’ve made the section from Penrith to Tebay, rather than making use of the emergency ground frames at Clifton & Lowther and the points at Shap Summit. In fact, the trailing crossover at Harrison’s Sidings could be used in lieu of Clifton & Lowther (albeit requiring a reverse).

Carlisle is one of the few boxes left with a relative abundance of trailing and emergency crossovers - I’m surprised they’re not being used to their fullest potential. It could dramatically improve throughput at the moment!
You are assuming none of them are out of use.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: ==

Many £ millions was spent relaying almost the whole of the double line S&C for passenger and freight traffic, yet all the coal traffic subsequently ceased and the line now has far, far fewer trains that don‘t justify the whole line being kept as a double line railway.
Why? You aren't going to save a lot by singling it anyway.
 

Lg_

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Carlisle is one of the few boxes left with a relative abundance of trailing and emergency crossovers

Not sure how many of the crossovers are under the wires? TPE are using 397's for the shuttles they're trying to throw together.
 

Lucy1501

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You are assuming none of them are out of use.
The crossovers at Shap Summit and Harrison’s Sidings are certainly still in use, not sure about Clifton.

Not sure how many of the crossovers are under the wires? TPE are using 397's for the shuttles they're trying to throw together.
Very good point - I didn’t think of that! I’d very much hope some of them are at least, I’d assume the two I mentioned above where.
 

Carlisle

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Avanti's policy now seems to be more like "at the slightest hint of trouble declare Do Not Travel and run nothing north of Preston, leaving TPE to pick up the pieces". It really is shoddy in the extreme.
I’ve often wondered given their new Bi Modes why they can’t run one or 2 daily services London- Scotland via the S & C.
 
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800001

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I’ve often wondered given their new Bi Modes why they can’t run one or 2 services London- Scotland via the S & C.
How much longer would that make the journey? If I was travelling wcml and saw the increased journey time, I would look to book a different service.
 

geoffk

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== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: ==

How much longer would that make the journey? If I was travelling wcml and saw the increased journey time, I would look to book a different service.
But at least it keeps people on the train rather than queuing for buses.
 

E502

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All of the crossovers, powered and ground frame/mechanical on the Carlisle box area of the WCML are wired, with the exception of the connections to and from Shap summit down sidings.
Could be they're using the shortest section available between power points worked from Carlisle box due to staffing issues. (The main line crossovers at Clifton & Shap are worked from ground frames).
 

Carlisle

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== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: ==


But at least it keeps people on the train rather than queuing for buses.
It’d retain route knowledge & give Appleby, Settle & Blackburn passengers at least 1 direct service each way between London & Scotland
 
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Deepgreen

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That was also my thought. I understand the purpose of trap points to be to prevent an unauthorised vehicle movement from fouling a running line; so the one in question seems not fit for purpose.
I wonder if the line is actually fouled or is the kinematic envelope just compromised? The difference could be that between a collision and a close thing. The photos from NR appear (and only that) as if a train could 'scrape' by without anything damaging happening, but I could be wrong. Obviously there is a difference between knowlingly allowing trains past and a derailment coming to rest near a passing train. I don't know if there is any sort of compromise used for trap points where OHLE masts are nearby.
 

800001

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I wonder if the line is actually fouled or is the kinematic envelope just compromised? The difference could be that between a collision and a close thing. The photos from NR appear (and only that) as if a train could 'scrape' by without anything damaging happening, but I could be wrong. Obviously there is a difference between knowlingly allowing trains past and a derailment coming to rest near a passing train. I don't know if there is any sort of compromise used for trap points where OHLE masts are nearby.
They ran a 57 down from Carlisle last night to check for clearance and it was determined that there was not sufficient clearance for trains to pass on the up line.
 

Deepgreen

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They ran a 57 down from Carlisle last night to check for clearance and it was determined that there was not sufficient clearance for trains to pass on the up line.
I know, but my point was about the safety suitability of the trap points (which had been questioned), in that the place where the freight came to rest would probably not have caused a damaging collision, but perhaps just a scrape or even a very close miss.
 

800001

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I know, but my point was about the safety suitability of the trap points (which had been questioned), in that the place where the freight came to rest would probably not have caused a damaging collision, but perhaps just a scrape or even a very close miss.
Reading your post again, that is not how it reads. You open by asking if the line is fouled, so interpret that as could they run things past.
 

Deepgreen

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== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: ==


But at least it keeps people on the train rather than queuing for buses.
The overall issue is that today's railway is hugely less flexible than in previous eras (with a far less than commensurate increase in safety) giving rise to railway-based alternative options being abandoned in favour of buses (or, often, a lack of them). This ranges from stuff like MOM shortages/lack of training to rolling stock shortages/lack of (paper) clearance/route knowledge, etc, etc.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: ==

Reading your post again, that is not how it reads. You open by asking if the line is fouled, so interpret that as could they run things past.
A (slight but potentially life-saving) difference between the line being physically fouled to the extent that a very serious collision could have occurred or just the kinematic envelope being compromised. I had no doubt that trains would not be able to run past after the accident but wondered if, at the time of the accident, disaster would not have ensued (i.e. the trap points did at least most of their job).
 

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ac6000cw

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Looks like a new BBC report has been appeared and has trackside photos showing how exactly derailed - if someone else could get the photos to appear in this thread please.
Title is Rail passengers told not to travel after derailment and link is https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c0448l4dglmo but my phone browser not enabling all the necessary options.

The new BBC pictures are from the NR website:
346b2e51f1fe4e6388ecbdaf53637c31.png
 

Agent_Squash

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Avanti's policy now seems to be more like "at the slightest hint of trouble declare Do Not Travel and run nothing north of Preston, leaving TPE to pick up the pieces". It really is shoddy in the extreme.
Indeed Avanti social media are now lying, as they did in response to my tweet saying that the incident ‘affects the whole line’

Because it affects the whole line, Alex. - Lucy

Northern services are serving Lancaster and Oxenholme still. Understandably it is difficult to terminate at Oxenholme, but there’s plenty of room to do it at Lancaster with connections to the Cumbrian coast round to Carlisle.

An hour round trip shouldn’t be out of the reach of the modern railway.
 
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Bletchleyite

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Indeed Avanti social media are now lying, as they did in response to my tweet saying that the incident ‘affects the whole line’

To be fair Avanti's social media do have rather an attitude problem - rude, dismissive, abrasive and downright incorrect responses seem to be the norm, with a couple of them in particular that would be better off working for Ryanair's comedy deliberately-confrontational social media setup rather than just being bad at customer service. Not everyone loved VT, but Branson would be spinning in his grave (were he not still alive) at what happened to it when Virgin stepped away.
 

Agent_Squash

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To be fair Avanti's social media do have rather an attitude problem - rude, dismissive, abrasive and downright incorrect responses seem to be the norm, with a couple of them in particular that would be better off working for Ryanair's comedy deliberately-confrontational social media setup rather than just being bad at customer service. Not everyone loved VT, but Branson would be spinning in his grave (were he not still alive) at what happened to it when Virgin stepped away.

I think it would be unfair to Ryanair’s social media team to associate Avanti with them!

Outright lies like the one made in that tweet just destroy passenger trust in the railway. Another reason to buy a car I suppose…
 
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