Class 91 Horse Collision - Tales of Fred Wagstaff (warning: gory content)

I was whistling softly to myself as Rossington Barriers got closer, then abruptly stopped and sat bolt upright in the chair - in the distance I saw a large animal on Toad Hole Lane footpath crossing. Gordon had seen it too; and in a matter of fact tone of voice, said - 'Blimey! Is that a horse?'

My first instinct was to try for an emergency stop, but there was so little time therefore I opted instead to keep line speed, and so if we did hit the animal it would either explode or get pushed out of our path. The last thing I wanted was to hit the animal at 60 or 70 and get derailed, because the first thing we would meet would be the overhead line posts on our left side or a train coming in the opposite direction if we went right...
Valhalla here we come!

You can imagine my relief when the animal turned away and slowly plodded off the railway. Gordon cried out - 'Bloody good job! Oh no, he's coming back!'
Sure enough, the beast had turned around and was just roaming aimlessly back onto the track again, only we could now see that it wasn't some puny pony, but a full blooded Shire horse about the size of a small Elephant! I pulled the power controller full open, grabbed the horn and gave a series of blasts, but he plodded on and on, and I knew we were going to collide. I stiffened my legs and slid my back up the chair thinking this is it....

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daikilo said:

Thankyou for providing this link, the stories are of course facts and very well written. What isn't humourous is sad, and both a lesson for anyone from HR.

I don't really need a pic of the damage as I can imagine as much as I ever would want to. Interesting driver thought process about braking or going flat out!

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GrimShady said:

I meant the physical damage to the 91, not pictures of it covered in horse

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Cowley said:

I just read some of the stuff in your link.
The incident with the horse looked absolutely shocking for the crew.

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GrimShady said:

I bet a Class 800 would fare just as bad as a DVT.

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DidcotDickie said:

Would it? (Genuine question) While the driving vehicles of the IETs are not motored, they do carry a transformer so I wouldn't expect them to be particularly light. Also I'd expect modern vehicles to be constructed to higher crashworthiness standards than a class 91.

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GrimShady said:

Maybe so but in this case I would think the sheer weight of the 91 helped keep it on the rails...and also smashing the poor horse to bits.

Remember what happened to the DBSO in the Polmont disaster.

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Pigeon said:

Reminds me of the tale of the chap who committed suicide by standing in front of a train somewhere around Birmingham International. The driver figured it would be less disruptive to carry on and stop in the station than to slam on the brakes too late to achieve anything in the middle of nowhere, so he did. As he came into the station there were people turning away and retching all along the platform... turned out the hook had gone right through the bloke and he was hanging on the front of the engine, with the hook sticking out of his chest and no feet where the ends of his legs had been abraded away dragging on the track.

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Pigeon said:

Reminds me of the tale of the chap who committed suicide by standing in front of a train somewhere around Birmingham International. The driver figured it would be less disruptive to carry on and stop in the station than to slam on the brakes too late to achieve anything in the middle of nowhere, so he did. As he came into the station there were people turning away and retching all along the platform... turned out the hook had gone right through the bloke and he was hanging on the front of the engine, with the hook sticking out of his chest and no feet where the ends of his legs had been abraded away dragging on the track.

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dubscottie said:

I know a 91 was out for months around 1992 or 1993 after it fired one of its cardan shafts through its roof. Not sure if its the same incident though.

Any idea on a date? I have a ton of old mags I could look through if we could narrow it down a bit.

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Pigeon said:

Reminds me of the tale of the chap who committed suicide by standing in front of a train somewhere around Birmingham International. The driver figured it would be less disruptive to carry on and stop in the station than to slam on the brakes too late to achieve anything in the middle of nowhere, so he did. As he came into the station there were people turning away and retching all along the platform... turned out the hook had gone right through the bloke and he was hanging on the front of the engine, with the hook sticking out of his chest and no feet where the ends of his legs had been abraded away dragging on the track.

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dubscottie said:

From RAIL No 162 (Nov 27th - December 10 1991) "91004 The Red Arrows has been admitted to Doncaster works for attention following a collision with a horse, the first 91 to receive attention here". It was present in Doncaster works on Nov 11th 1991. I am going to look for RAIL numbers 163/164 etc and check the works reports at the back to see when it left.

Edit - Had a look there and unfortunately there are gaps in my collection. From what I have found, it appears to have returned to service at some point during Feb 1992

A quick search on Flick shows it in the works but from the blunt end. It looks like it spent most of Nov & Dec 1991 parked in the same spot outdoors. Waiting for an insurance ruling maybe?

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GrimShady said:

Excellent find dubscottie!

Must have taken you all day scrolling through the various publications.

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