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Heat related issues (25 July 2019 and subsequent days)

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bramling

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Not sure about ECML, but they DIDN'T advise that this morning on the WCML. A full morning peak was run, which is very daft if you don't expect to get them home. Others thinned all day. WCML infrastructure itself holding up very well, touch wood.

On my way in I was musing as to whether an emergency timetable might have been considered. GTR seem to have sort of done that, with modifications having been input from the late morning onwards. Clearly events massively overtook this pre-planning.

Perhaps the ideal might have been to have had a managed transition to emergency timetable after the morning peak. But we’d probably then be reading on here posts suggesting the railway had “thrown in the towel” et cetera.

Damned if one does and damned if one doesn’t springs to mind.
 
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captainbigun

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Which is why you put out a do not travel clear and early. Only Southeastern had one on National Rail yesterday evening, fair play to them. What did GA have out? It wasn't on NRE you can hardly bleat about people travelling if they were selling tickets and taking them in.

To be fair they were very clear as early as yesterday afternoon. Service will be thinned do not travel unless essential.
 

Bromley boy

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*I do wonder about folks, gonna be the hottest day of the year, all on the news that trains might have issues, I know, lets all wander round London for the day.
(spent my day sweating in the back cab of a 313, aKA, the Southern Sauna)

Agreed. The message was put out loud and clear.

I have every sympathy for those who cannot avoid travelling, rather less for those who choose to make “discretionary” journeys during an extreme weather event.
 

EMD

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What do you mean by "an electric explosion"?

I was on the train to St Albans and had a close up view of the incident since the explosion happened right in front of my face. An MML HST going into STP triggerd this and then the overhead line collapsed onto the fast line and also landed on our train. We stopped literally 400/500 yards short of the station (as did another TL going out of WHP towards KTN) and that meant being stuck for 2h on a train with no AC and closed doors. The TL going into London moved back into WHP roughly 45 mins after the incident. Whereas we were left stranded.

The updates were frequent (until the onboard batteries died about 100mins in) and the staff were helpful but there was zero specifics as to what they will do and when they will do something to evacuate us out of what quickly became a sauna. After almost 2hrs we got told that we will be evacuated through the front cabin of our train onto the tracks and then hop onto the other TL through which we then walked onto platform 1.

What's interesting is that the exact spot where the HST tripped the OHLE there is a temporary speed restriction, possibly they wanted to prevent this but it wasn't enough? You can see it in the picture below. The arrow shows where the cable dropped. The box on the top shows the smoke from the fire.

Y9I5OIi.jpg
 

Deepgreen

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Given that so many warnings are in place about the entire rail network's vulnerability to heart-buckled rails, why is it only SE that have had restrictions imposed owing to the potential for buckled rails? Why will SWR's network, for example, seemingly not suffer this problem? Have all the overhead wire issues been owing to buckled cables?
 

sarahj

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On my way in I was musing as to whether an emergency timetable might have been considered. GTR seem to have sort of done that, with modifications having been input from the late morning onwards. Clearly events massively overtook this pre-planning.

Perhaps the ideal might have been to have had a managed transition to emergency timetable after the morning peak. But we’d probably then be reading on here posts suggesting the railway had “thrown in the towel” et cetera.

Damned if one does and damned if one doesn’t springs to mind.

We sort of spent the morning trying to run an almost full timetable for the peak, but kept telling folks their return journey would be affected. Once peak was over, switched to the backup, no gatex's, terminate arun valley's at Barnham/Bognor, stop WLL trains. Alas, other issues on points/tracks did cause additional delays. The problem is, your working a train from Seaford, which connects at Lewes to the first train super off peaks are valid. Your train is packed and more than 3/4 get off to make the connection, and they are all families out of a jolly to the smoke. I even told some they are mad, but it's 'stuff experts' etc etc
 

Deepgreen

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I took hundreds in this morning on the GEML but later they where people going for days out in London paying no attention to the warnings. When everything goes wrong later the TOCs are lumbered with them & they can't wait to bleat about their plight & the dreadful way they've been left stranded.
It is naively unreasonable to expect people to cancel their plans if they have been paid for already, or if their kids are newly off school and want/have been promised a day out, or if relatives are meeting, etc., etc. In short, people simply rarely view their particular journey as non-essential.
l
 

sharpley

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I was on the train to St Albans and had a close up view of the incident since the explosion happened right in front of my face. An MML HST going into STP triggerd this and then the overhead line collapsed onto the fast line and also landed on our train.

How does an HST trigger this out of interest? Did the explosion happen first causing the OHLE to fall?
 

ashkeba

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A good day to drive to and from work!!!
First day of school holidays in some areas, melting roads and some horrible collisions have left many people stuck in little more than mobile greenhouses today, at least in the West Anglia area. The advice was correctly "do not travel" today and not limited to railways (so I worked from home - it's like walking into a fan oven when you go outside). At least on the railways, you know the heroic workers are there to deal with events and see you safe in ways that the highways departments just don't.
 

BJames

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It is naively unreasonable to expect people to cancel their plans if they have been paid for already, or if their kids are newly off school and want/have been promised a day out, or if relatives are meeting, etc., etc. In short, people simply rarely view their particular journey as non-essential.
l
True - but in some cases, the unwillingness to change plans that are perfectly changeable leads to people going out and finding themselves stranded, something which is ultimately unavoidable for many commuters but it is avoidable in some instances.

Observed a few trains going to Enfield Town today at Bush Hill Park - granted, it's at the far end of the line but there did seem to be less people trying to use the service, including in the morning peak. But nothing ran for a few hours after 3pm ish anyway.
 

Deepgreen

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All the warnings leading up to today were concerned with the potential for buckling rails, whereas all the major problems seem to have been OHLE (have ANY rail issues been reported?). Are these coincidences, or has OHLE now also joined the ranks of engineering not heat-proofed? I note that it is thought that an HST triggered the MML issue - very odd, given its lack of pantograph or anything else that would come anywhere near the OHLE. Surely OHLE wouldn't slacken so much in one section that it dropped the several feet needed to foul a train?

A set of semi-rhetorical questions here - too early to answer I expect.
 

EMD

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How does an HST trigger this out of interest? Did the explosion happen first causing the OHLE to fall?

I only started paying attention when the thing exploded in front of me but from my point of view it look like the explosion caused the OHLE to fall.
 

underbank

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True - but in some cases, the unwillingness to change plans that are perfectly changeable leads to people going out and finding themselves stranded, something which is ultimately unavoidable for many commuters but it is avoidable in some instances.

Whilst it's easy to criticise leisure travellers, it's common these days to have to book your attraction entrance tickets long in advance. Nearly always, these are not transferrable/cancellable. Perhaps pressure should be put upon the attractions themselves to honour changes when there is travel disruption expected. Few people are going to be happy to lose the money they've spent on entrance tickets. Same with hotel bookings, etc - affordable options are usually non-cancellable.
 

Deepgreen

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True - but in some cases, the unwillingness to change plans that are perfectly changeable leads to people going out and finding themselves stranded, something which is ultimately unavoidable for many commuters but it is avoidable in some instances.

Observed a few trains going to Enfield Town today at Bush Hill Park - granted, it's at the far end of the line but there did seem to be less people trying to use the service, including in the morning peak. But nothing ran for a few hours after 3pm ish anyway.
Agreed, but it's human nature to carry on with plans unless almost physically prevented at the start. I don't claim to be immune from this either!
 

dk1

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It is naively unreasonable to expect people to cancel their plans if they have been paid for already, or if their kids are newly off school and want/have been promised a day out, or if relatives are meeting, etc., etc. In short, people simply rarely view their particular journey as non-essential.
l
I know. I see it time & time again. Not so bad if just adults as you just go to the pub & get wasted but when you've got young children with you it turns miserable very quickly.
 

tsr

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As if all this wasn't enough, someone has elected to close the entire station throat at Waterloo by chasing their dog around the track...

No District Line to Wimbledon either - fire alert at Wimbledon Park...
 

Deepgreen

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Whilst it's easy to criticise leisure travellers, it's common these days to have to book your attraction entrance tickets long in advance. Nearly always, these are not transferrable/cancellable. Perhaps pressure should be put upon the attractions themselves to honour changes when there is travel disruption expected. Few people are going to be happy to lose the money they've spent on entrance tickets. Same with hotel bookings, etc - affordable options are usually non-cancellable.
Then the risk-adoption chain starts extending - i.e. who is willing/able to bear the risk of revenue loss owing to circumstances beyond their immediate control, and try to pass it along the chain for recompense, etc?
 

EMD

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I note that it is thought that an HST triggered the MML issue - very odd, given its lack of pantograph or anything else that would come anywhere near the OHLE. Surely OHLE wouldn't slacken so much in one section that it dropped the several feet needed to foul a train?

A set of semi-rhetorical questions here - too early to answer I expect.

There were 3 trains at the same time in that spot, 2 of which have a pantograph (both on slow), yet the OHLE collapsed on the line occupied by the HST. That particular section (where the arrow is in the picture above) is where TL trains cross from fast to slow and they do it at fairly decent speed so a) the speed restriction possibly was meant to save it b) it might have been weakened before and the HST and the 2 TL trains completed the blow.
 

sarahj

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All the warnings leading up to today were concerned with the potential for buckling rails, whereas all the major problems seem to have been OHLE (have ANY rail issues been reported?). Are these coincidences, or has OHLE now also joined the ranks of engineering not heat-proofed? I note that it is thought that an HST triggered the MML issue - very odd, given its lack of pantograph or anything else that would come anywhere near the OHLE. Surely OHLE wouldn't slacken so much in one section that it dropped the several feet needed to foul a train?

A set of semi-rhetorical questions here - too early to answer I expect.

We had one track issue this morning between Southease and Newhaven which led to a 20 TSR. Points seems to having issues, we lost a couple today and some on tuesday. Having so many moving parts, the heat could affect any part and it sticks.
 

BJames

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Whilst it's easy to criticise leisure travellers, it's common these days to have to book your attraction entrance tickets long in advance. Nearly always, these are not transferrable/cancellable. Perhaps pressure should be put upon the attractions themselves to honour changes when there is travel disruption expected. Few people are going to be happy to lose the money they've spent on entrance tickets. Same with hotel bookings, etc - affordable options are usually non-cancellable.
Actually very good point, although getting different companies to work together can sometimes be quite challenging.
 

bionic

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Reality check: It's just a bit of a heatwave. We get the same result with snow, too much rain, ice on the juice rail etc. Happens a few times each year. I think lots of people on here are being hysterical and sensationalist about all of this. It's hot, the trains are knackered. Deal with it.

Discuss it by all means (and it's an interesting discussion) but there are a few people on here carrying on like its armageddon when it's just a bit of a balmy day.
 

BJames

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As if all this wasn't enough, someone has elected to close the entire station throat at Waterloo by chasing their dog around the track...

No District Line to Wimbledon either - fire alert at Wimbledon Park...
What's going on at Waterloo? Seen a few different things on twitter..
 

westv

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Assuming everything is ok tomorrow is anybody prepared to speculate whether I am better resuming my abandoned LNER journey from Kings X as early as possible tomorrow or to leave it to later?
 

ChiefPlanner

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Whilst it's easy to criticise leisure travellers, it's common these days to have to book your attraction entrance tickets long in advance. Nearly always, these are not transferrable/cancellable. Perhaps pressure should be put upon the attractions themselves to honour changes when there is travel disruption expected. Few people are going to be happy to lose the money they've spent on entrance tickets. Same with hotel bookings, etc - affordable options are usually non-cancellable.

A very good point about family budgets and booking attractions ahead. Personally with young children we avoided London in the summer for the "heat island effect" - this absolute cocktail of disasters is going to leave a lot of very unhappy people with massively extended days and dissatisfaction. Let alone the commuters who literally were told to come in or else.
 

ChiefPlanner

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Given that so many warnings are in place about the entire rail network's vulnerability to heart-buckled rails, why is it only SE that have had restrictions imposed owing to the potential for buckled rails? Why will SWR's network, for example, seemingly not suffer this problem? Have all the overhead wire issues been owing to buckled cables?

Sagging cables surely ? - even Radio 4 got the message right tonight with Simon Calder -who seems to know his stuff. The 3d rail empire in my experience only suffered track and on-track fires in very hot weather , abr the odd exploding " insulator pot".
 

Omnishambles

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Given that so many warnings are in place about the entire rail network's vulnerability to heart-buckled rails, why is it only SE that have had restrictions imposed owing to the potential for buckled rails? Why will SWR's network, for example, seemingly not suffer this problem? Have all the overhead wire issues been owing to buckled cables?

Must admit I thought it a bit strange that SWR hadn’t at least looked at thinning tonight’s peak but from what I’ve seen it doesn’t seem to have been that bad on the SWML during today. You could say that SW got lucky and SE maybe didn’t need to introduce a full emergency timetable or track condition is slightly better therefore less ESR potential, either way, either TOC damned if you do, damned if you don’t. I was fortunate enough to be able to work from home today and having spent 20+ years as a controller decided I was going nowhere a train. From a staff point of view my thumbs up and well dones go to ALL the frontline and front facing staff today, from customer hosts to signallers to BTP to maintenance staff... oh and now I hear the thunderstorms are coming in so I can hear the S+T shiver
 

reddragon

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Just looked at the live boards from each London termini.

Only HS1 is running on time, with Paddington / Marylebone operating many trains. The rest, all cancelled / delayed!
 

bramling

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It is naively unreasonable to expect people to cancel their plans if they have been paid for already, or if their kids are newly off school and want/have been promised a day out, or if relatives are meeting, etc., etc. In short, people simply rarely view their particular journey as non-essential.
l

It might be naive, but that doesn’t make it any more sensible. I try to avoid non-refundable hotel bookings for this very reason, even so I’ve had to suck up losses on occasions thanks to the weather, it’s just one of those facts of life.

For the sake of avoiding writing off the cost of a few tickets, is it *really* worth risking being stuck for hours in an overcrowded sauna full of families? It’s utter madness.
 
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