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Network Rail caught short on Wessex & Sussex?

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pompeyfan

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Various issues this morning in 3rd rail land with South Western and Southern being delayed or cancelled due to ice on the third rail. 1W51 failed across Worting Junction, another train has just reached Haslemere 260L after being stuck at Milford, whilst Farncombe on the UP had a similar issue. Southern also had the same issue reported around Three Bridges.

My question is why weren’t they more prepared? The cold weather was predicted, ususally De-icer MPVs or ghost units run around, that seems not to have happened over night.
 
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GarethW

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Ridiculous not even snow - widely predicted.

Nothing running north from Eastleigh at the moment.
 
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LAX54

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Think its the RHTT's that are really late (200+) but they don't really count in the grand scheme of things :) Main delay was to W51 that needed assistance from the 0619 ex Woking
 
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Lockwood

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I'm on a train to Victoria which is now going via Brighton.
it left Havant on time, but is a sardine special. Conductor advised passengers wanting London area might wish to change at Brighton for a service starting there to get a seat.

If you stay on the original device and arrive later than the original arrival time, but left on time, is this covered on delay repay? If you choose to change to a comfortable service is that covered? (Assuming the delay was over thirty minutes)

There were no announcements about service issues at Havant when I was there, albeit for 5 minutes max, so I had just figured at first that the service was normally this unpleasant. Normally I drive to Merton Park and get a tram to Croydon. The one time I get a train direct......
 
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Deepgreen

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This does seem to be happening more and more. Trains are more delicate these days, but the frequency of icy juice rails stopping the railway is ridiculous. Each time it happens we are told that "lessons will be learned" and that "measures will be put in place to stop a recurrence". However...
 
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theironroad

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I believe on the MPVs used in Wessex land, the issue is that the modules they carry for railhead treatment and con rail deicing cannot be easily interchanged, so the MPVs are still running with cleaning and treating the railhead , which is still needed as rail adhesion has been poor the last few days and there's still plenty of leaves on the trees. I think the deicing modules are fitted around the same time as the timetable change in early December, but happy to be corrected on exact timing. I also believe the deicing units have to have a second operator while railhead runs doo.

While ghost trains have a use, they really need to keep running all night to keep the con rail ice freezer otherwise it's just the ghost Train that gets stranded rather than the service one, then there is the matter of finding available units and drivers.
 
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pompeyfan

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Lockwood said:
I'm on a train to Victoria which is now going via Brighton.
it left Havant on time, but is a sardine special. Conductor advised passengers wanting London area might wish to change at Brighton for a service starting there to get a seat.

If you stay on the original device and arrive later than the original arrival time, but left on time, is this covered on delay repay? If you choose to change to a comfortable service is that covered? (Assuming the delay was over thirty minutes)

There were no announcements about service issues at Havant when I was there, albeit for 5 minutes max, so I had just figured at first that the service was normally this unpleasant. Normally I drive to Merton Park and get a tram to Croydon. The one time I get a train direct......
Click to expand...

From what I can see all services from Havant to Victoria are running via Worthing due to weekend works around Crawley, this isn’t weather related.
 
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Lockwood

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Not a clue. Conductor said that the crowding was due to all the waterloo passengers being sent to Victoria due to SWR services not running
 
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infobleep

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They were trying to source buses today but struggling to do so. A 7.34 additional service between Guildford and Woking ram but I'm not sure where the stock came from.

They have managed to sourcs buses but they are not running to a timetable.

I've managed to get a slightly late running 12.34 that started from Guildford heading south.

The other day South Western Railway put up a notice on journey check and only journey check for the following day, warning of slower running and potential delays due to wind. Southeen; Gatwick Express and Thameslink had a similar warning, only hey were able to get theirs onto National Rail Enquiries Web Sirte. What is the reason they couldn't put up a similar notice in advance for the ice today?

Clearly they wouldn't know if it would ice over but equally they wouldn't know if there would be problems due to wind.

If it's not financially viable to have an MPV in deicing mode, waiting to be used, then they need to say we can't so this before x date. We wish we could help but it's not financially viable to do so when we still need to deal with the leaves.

At work I update the winter gritting maps. They need a plan in place by 1st November with the ability to deploy as needed. If Network Rail can afford it, they also need to have something in place by then with the ability to deploy as needed.

I didn't think the leaves so bad this year in terms of delays but maybe they are just falling off later.
 
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LAX54

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Pomo to Victoria are indeed booked via the 'Coastway' route today ....Hove, then Preston Park
 
MG11

MG11

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The title of the thread gave me images of Network Rail workers urinating on the third rail!
 
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SpacePhoenix

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How large are the de-icer modules, would they be too large to have some sort of variant bolted to the underside of a Desiro or Electrostar (where the space exists)?
 
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TEW

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swills said:
Think its the RHTT's that are really late (200+) but they don't really count in the grand scheme of things :) Main delay was to W51 that needed assistance from the 0619 ex Woking
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Two passenger services on the Portsmouth Direct Line were severely delayed too.
0515 Guildford-Portsmouth Harbour finally reached it's first station Haslemere at 0949, 4 hours and 21 minutes late.
0514 Portsmouth Harbour-London Waterloo got stuck at Farncombe for the best part of 3 hours, eventually terminating at Guildford at 0944, 3 hours and 12 minutes late.
 
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theironroad

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TEW said:
Two passenger services on the Portsmouth Direct Line were severely delayed too.
0515 Guildford-Portsmouth Harbour finally reached it's first station Haslemere at 0949, 4 hours and 21 minutes late.
0514 Portsmouth Harbour-London Waterloo got stuck at Farncombe for the best part of 3 hours, eventually terminating at Guildford at 0944, 3 hours and 12 minutes late.
Click to expand...

Wouldn't have liked to be on either of those, as heating would have failed when lost line light.
 
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swt_passenger

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SpacePhoenix said:
How large are the de-icer modules, would they be too large to have some sort of variant bolted to the underside of a Desiro or Electrostar (where the space exists)?
Click to expand...
In service de-icing equipment can be and is fitted to a few Electrostars, in the case of a few 378s on LO and some 375s on SE, so the concept is feasible, and could presumably fitted to Desiros just as easily.

But size wise the type of equipment fitted to a few in service EMUs cannot treat the whole network overnight, dedicated trains are necessary as well.
 
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87015

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swt_passenger said:
In service de-icing equipment can be and is fitted to a few Electrostars, in the case of a few 378s on LO and some 375s on SE, so the concept is feasible, and could presumably fitted to Desiros just as easily.

But size wise the type of equipment fitted to a few in service EMUs cannot treat the whole network overnight, dedicated trains are necessary as well.
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It's in the TOCs gift to get those stock fitted and then out on nights of a heavy forecast of course rather than leaving it in depots. Believe said 378s were doing just that.
 
najaB

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87015 said:
It's in the TOCs gift to get those stock fitted and then out on nights of a heavy forecast of course rather than leaving it in depots. Believe said 378s were doing just that.
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As with everything there's a cost involved with that and [insert comment about the fragmented modern railway] why should the TOC pay to keep NR's railway open?
 
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Paul180

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I am not surprised there was problems this morning. There was a heavy frost overnight followed by a heavy rain at about 5 am which then re-froze. I got the second train of the day from Reading to Redhill and it was struggling at times and that was a diesel train. I don't know if there was heavy wind overnight but between Aldershot south junction and Guildford there was some arcing going on so it must have been from debris on the line as it was a diesel train
 
ComUtoR

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Wow Mr p, I'm actually quite surprised.

Lost +5 this morning into Blackfriars (slippery conditions) but, arched quite a fair bit and my unit really didn't like it. There was a +25 Bedford I think and a cancellation.

The ice cannot really be reasonably prevented. Even when you go out ghosting the juice can refreeze before the next trip. the MPV's run a circuit and then the line can be empty overnight. The probability to refreeze is really quite high. Even in normal running the juice can easily ice over between services.

Cancellations are random at the best of times and the slightest delay can knock a service out and the knock on effect compounds it further.

Ice has always been a nightmare in DC land.
 
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Chrisgr31

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Lockwood said:
If you stay on the original device and arrive later than the original arrival time, but left on time, is this covered on delay repay? If you choose to change to a comfortable service is that covered? (Assuming the delay was over thirty minutes)
Click to expand...

Its worth remembering that Southern pay out on 15 minute delay. If you changed trains then I would complete the delay repay and tick the other button and write "Due to severe over crowding and length of journey followed conductors adive and changed trains at Brighton" or something similar
 
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Sabre999uk

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We arrived at Havant at 0750 and was advised as the 0804 to Waterloo had been diverted via Eastleigh to take the Southern service due at 0757 to Fratton and get the 0824 to Waterloo that would be stopping at Woking and Waterloo only. While we were waiting for the Southern service there were regular announcement to passengers for any stations to Guildford to make their way to the front of the station where alternative transport would be provided. We arrived at Waterloo at 1018 instead of our planned 0923.

On the way home on the 1800 from Waterloo there was a group of passengers complaining about the morning's delays including the comment 'I hope South Western have heated the rails this evening'....

Steve
 
BestWestern

BestWestern

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Sabre999uk said:
On the way home on the 1800 from Waterloo there was a group of passengers complaining about the morning's delays including the comment 'I hope South Western have heated the rails this evening'....

Steve
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A pretty sensible comment really when you think about it. They already do, in certain places. If they can put heated winscreens in Fiestas, you can forgive a fare paying passenger for assuming the railway might be clued up enough to have something in place to prevent the south east commuter belt grinding to a halt!
 
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pompeyfan

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BestWestern said:
A pretty sensible comment really when you think about it. They already do, in certain places. If they can put heated winscreens in Fiestas, you can forgive a fare paying passenger for assuming the railway might be clued up enough to have something in place to prevent the south east commuter belt grinding to a halt!
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Even more so if you were to tell them that some points and crossings are heated.

Some of the twitter comments actually made sense though and I can see Joe public’s point. The main issue is that Friday night/Saturday morning wasn’t particularly cold, it was fresh, but there’s certainly been mornings that have been colder.

The point I think I’m trying to make is that we’re only just entering winter, and there will be colder spells, why are those usually dealt with effectively, but NR seemingly got caught out. I would assume it’s something to do with moisture content in the air and on the ground? A period of prolonged, dry frost won’t cause as many issues as a snap hard frost?
 
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Lockwood

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Chrisgr31 said:
Its worth remembering that Southern pay out on 15 minute delay. If you changed trains then I would complete the delay repay and tick the other button and write "Due to severe over crowding and length of journey followed conductors adive and changed trains at Brighton" or something similar
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Thanks, I have done that.
I would have been 18L if I had stayed on the sardine can, looking at the times on RTT.
 
BRblue

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pompeyfan said:
Even more so if you were to tell them that some points and crossings are heated.

Some of the twitter comments actually made sense though and I can see Joe public’s point. The main issue is that Friday night/Saturday morning wasn’t particularly cold, it was fresh, but there’s certainly been mornings that have been colder.

The point I think I’m trying to make is that we’re only just entering winter, and there will be colder spells, why are those usually dealt with effectively, but NR seemingly got caught out. I would assume it’s something to do with moisture content in the air and on the ground? A period of prolonged, dry frost won’t cause as many issues as a snap hard frost?
Click to expand...
As I understand it the problem only arose when a heavy shower of rain turned to ice immediately upon contact with a very cold con rail... whether that should happen is another debate entirely.
 
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