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Commuter dragged after hand stuck in door

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maniacmartin

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Hi,

I read this article today in the London Evening Standard.

http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/news/...er-getting-hand-trapped-on-train-7807118.html

Duck Murray for the London Evening Standard said:
Horror on the 5.53! Commuter dragged 200 feet after getting hand trapped on train

A woman cheated death after getting her hand trapped in a train door as it pulled away in front of horrified commuters.

Station staff were powerless to stop the train and the passenger only managed to free herself at the last second.

Rail safety chiefs today revealed the sequence of events which could easily have proved fatal.

The woman, a regular commuter who is not named, was aiming to catch the 5.53 pm First Capital Connect from platform nine at King’s Cross to Royston.

Thinking she had time to spare she passed the first carriages and walked towards the front of the train. She heard the door closing alarm but thought at first that was for an adjacent train.

Realising it was her train about to depart she went to step on board, her hand in front, just as the doors closed.

The door closed with the rubber edge trapping the fingers of her left hand while she was still on the platform.

The train dispatcher saw the woman but was unaware her hand was trapped and signalled the train away.

As the train started to move off the woman was forced to walk and then run alongside it.

The train dispatcher realised what was happening but by that time had no means of stopping the train.

After more than 60 metres the woman managed to pull her hand free - possibly aided by unknown passengers on board who were tugging at the door trying to force them open.

They also operated the on-board passenger alarm but the driver did not stop immediately and continued to Finsbury Park.

The woman was left standing shaken on the platform as staff rushed to give first-aid. She later attended hopsital where her fingers were found to be badly bruised but not broken.

In a report of the incident, which happened last October, the investigating Rail Accident Investigation Board (RAIB,) concluded:

The train dispatcher did not carry out a full safety check before allowing the train to depart;
The passenger attempted to board the train while the doors were closing;
The passenger alarm was operated after the train had travelled about 17 metres; under rules the driver should have stopped if part of the train was in a station - which it was. Instead he continued to the next station.

His actions, nowever, the RAIB stress, had “no effect” on what happened but his action could have under different circumstances “resulted in a more serious outcome.”

The RAIB make a number of recommendations to prevent anything similar happening again.

Renewed training is being given to train and station staff. There will be more frequent public address announcements warning passengers of the dangers of trying to board trains when the doors are closing.

Drivers are also being told to stop immediately if the alarm is raised while they are in or have just left a station.

Not excusing the passenger who tried to board as the doors were closing (!), I find it very odd that the driver apparently kept going to the next station even though the passenger alarm was pulled. I would have expected the train to have been stopped if it was still partially in platform.
 
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IanXC

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Dick Murray said:
There will be more frequent public address announcements warning passengers of the dangers of trying to board trains when the doors are closing.

Another one for the list eh!
 

GB

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The report clearly states her fingers were released after the train moved about 20 metres. Where did the person that wrote that article get "over 60 metres" or the 200ft from? :roll:
 

Flamingo

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Another arguement for having a guard on each train, if mcNulty is implemented there may not even be dispatch staff...
 

ainsworth74

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Five posts. I expected it to begin sooner ;)

Still it seems mistakes might have been made all round on this one, though of course the biggest one has to be trying to board a train once the doors have started to close. Is it also just me or do FCC seem to be having rather a lot of RAIB reports published about them?
 

All Line Rover

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Without wishing to sound insensitive, it was her own fault for being such an idiot, and if a few idiots get injured from time to time by trying to board a train when the doors are closing, it will serve as a warning to others. I can't recall a single time when I've visited London and didn't see at least one person trying this on the tube.

In this particular incident, it appears that the most significant issue was the driver failing to stop when the passenger alarm was activated. If drivers stop as soon as the passenger alarm is activated there should be no problems in these circumstances. Perhaps it would be a good idea to also have passenger alarms on train exteriors, to allow people on the platform to stop a train in an emergency?
 

Failed Unit

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Another arguement for having a guard on each train, if mcNulty is implemented there may not even be dispatch staff...

Why? Just on the fact the gaurd would be at one end and the dispatch at the other? Surely the gaurd can't see the entire train either?

Not disputing your point you are a gaurd afterall, just interested in the reasons.
 

All Line Rover

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Another arguement for having a guard on each train, if mcNulty is implemented there may not even be dispatch staff...

Although I value guards and dispatch staff, I am in disbelief if one of the main justifications for retaining them is the ignorance and stupidity of the travelling public.
 

TGV

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That's another incident on 365 doors. They mentioned that the closing force of the doors is unusually high and exceeds current standards, but were OK for when the stock was made. The fabric pull-out tests done after the Huntingdon incident showed this.

The door mechanism is to be adjusted at mid life refurb starting next year.
 

All Line Rover

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That's another incident on 365 doors. They mentioned that the closing force of the doors is unusually high and exceeds current standards, but were OK for when the stock was made. The fabric pull-out tests done after the Huntingdon incident showed this.

The door mechanism is to be adjusted at mid life refurb starting next year.

That's nice, but are the doors on a Class 365 really as powerful as, say, a Voyager? Further, why didn't the Class 365 doors detect this obstruction?
 

Flamingo

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Although I value guards and dispatch staff, I am in disbelief if one of the main justifications for retaining them is the ignorance and stupidity of the travelling public.

Their main role is to try and alleviate the ignorance and stupidity of the travelling public...
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---
Why? Just on the fact the gaurd would be at one end and the dispatch at the other? Surely the gaurd can't see the entire train either?

Not disputing your point you are a gaurd afterall, just interested in the reasons.
No, but the guard can stop the train at a signal from the dispatch staff on the platform (or the sight of disconnected limbs flying past his window)...
 
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455driver

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Maybe they should remove the rubber edging strip and replace it with (rusty) razor blades that way nothing would ever get stuck in th edoors and thickies like this woman (a regular commuter no less) wont do it again, at least not with that hand! ;)
 

TGV

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That's nice, but are the doors on a Class 365 really as powerful as, say, a Voyager? Further, why didn't the Class 365 doors detect this obstruction?

I'd say they are way more "powerful" to use your word. I would say based on vibrational resonance and the sound, I'd say that the IFE doors on the 365 close with a hell of a thump compared to most stock. The design of the seal is also a contributory factor.

There is a sensitive edge as standards mandate, but if you read the report, it explains clearly how an average femal finger compresses the seal, but not enough so that the sensitve edge detects an obstruction. A foot, leg, arm, knee or head - fine, but small fingers and fabric are unlikely to be detected. There are clear signs on the inside and outside of the doors providing warnings.
 

LE Greys

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The report brings up an interesting point on Page 14
32 Class 365 trains also include safety circuits intended to prevent the train starting to move if any of the doors are not properly closed. These circuits rely on switches which detect when the doors have reached the closed position and are locked. The need for compressible seals means that it is possible for doors to be detected in this condition, and the train can start moving, when the seals have deformed around a small object.
33 The doors were designed on the basis that small objects might become trapped, but can then be pulled out. Therefore the doors can be detected as closed if a small object, not exceeding 25 mm in thickness, is trapped between them. The incident doors met the design criteria when tested after the accident. As adult female fingers are typically 11 mm to 14 mm thick when squeezed, these criteria mean that the doors can trap fingers.

Now, I would have thought that they would have gone for a somewhat smaller figure, 10mm maybe, since this system is designed to prevent such a thing happening. Maybe 5mm, if we want to prevent children's fingers from becoming trapped (which is far more likely, let's face it).

<EDIT> Looks like I'm not the only one to spot this.
 

PTF62

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Maybe they should remove the rubber edging strip and replace it with (rusty) razor blades that way nothing would ever get stuck in th edoors and thickies like this woman (a regular commuter no less) wont do it again, at least not with that hand! ;)

And maybe they should chop the hands off dispatchers and drivers that don't do their jobs properly ;)
 

All Line Rover

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I'd say they are way more "powerful" to use your word. I would say based on vibrational resonance and the sound, I'd say that the IFE doors on the 365 close with a hell of a thump compared to most stock. The design of the seal is also a contributory factor.

There is a sensitive edge as standards mandate, but if you read the report, it explains clearly how an average femal finger compresses the seal, but not enough so that the sensitve edge detects an obstruction. A foot, leg, arm, knee or head - fine, but small fingers and fabric are unlikely to be detected. There are clear signs on the inside and outside of the doors providing warnings.

I'm thinking of the Victoria line stock, which seems to be able to detect anything as thin as a sheet of tracing paper. Should this safety mechanism be rolled out more widely? (Taking into account the frequent problems this safety mechanism has been causing the Victoria line).
 

Eagle

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Interesting point no-one's made: it's against the byelaws to go through a door (or attempt to do so) when it's closing.

Byelaw 10(5) said:
In the case of automatic closing doors, no person shall enter or leave by the door when it is closing.

So this woman was actually committing an offence by trying to get on the train after the chimes sounded.
 

Failed Unit

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Their main role is to try and alleviate the ignorance and stupidity of the travelling public...
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

No, but the guard can stop the train at a signal from the dispatch staff on the platform (or the sight of disconnected limbs flying past his window)...

Thank you - fair point. It was stated dispatch could do nothing to stop the train. The old long buzz would do the trick.
 

43167

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Hi,

I read this article today in the London Evening Standard.

http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/news/...er-getting-hand-trapped-on-train-7807118.html



Not excusing the passenger who tried to board as the doors were closing (!), I find it very odd that the driver apparently kept going to the next station even though the passenger alarm was pulled. I would have expected the train to have been stopped if it was still partially in platform.

I was thinking the same. I thought when someone pulled the chord, the brakes came on. Despite this happening back it october, people still try to rush to make the earlier train home.
 

Mutant Lemming

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Maybe they should remove the rubber edging strip and replace it with (rusty) razor blades that way nothing would ever get stuck in th edoors and thickies like this woman (a regular commuter no less) wont do it again, at least not with that hand! ;)

You are forgetting we now live in Jeremy Kyle land and it is never your own fault but always someone else who is to blame.

Instead of the emphasis being on the passenger ignoring door alarm chimes and trying to board after the train's departure time it is now switched to whether or not the alarm was operated before the train left the platform so that the driver can be blamed.

It is time a fixed penalty was introduced for people who 'interfere with the safe operation of the railway'. If people were fined £60 on the spot for holding open or attmepting to obstruct doors then it would soon cease.
 

PTF62

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It is time a fixed penalty was introduced for people who 'interfere with the safe operation of the railway'. If people were fined £60 on the spot for holding open or attmepting to obstruct doors then it would soon cease.

Absolutely. And the two people here who were interfering with the safe operation of the railway were -

- The dispacher who should not have indicated that the train was safe to leave; and
- The driver who failed to stop when they should after the alarm was sounded.

So I hope that you are demanding that the full force of the law be used against them.
 

ainsworth74

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And the two people here who were interfering with the safe operation of the railway were

You're suggesting that the woman wasn't 'interfering with the safe operation of the railway'?
 

PTF62

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You're suggesting that the woman wasn't 'interfering with the safe operation of the railway'?

I am suggesting that there were two trained people employed to do a safety critical job to protect members of the public, and they both failed badly.

That to me is far far worse than the actions of the passenger that were merely foolish because she thought something would happen that did not (that the doors would open if something was between them).

The two trained people *knew* that would not happen, and yet failed in their duty to protect the passnger.
 

Flamingo

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I was thinking the same. I thought when someone pulled the chord, the brakes came on. Despite this happening back it october, people still try to rush to make the earlier train home.

Old stock, brakes come on, new stock the driver is alerted, but stops the train in an appropriate place.

It prevents the scenario where, for example, a train is on fire and gets stopped in the middle of a tunnel by a passenger. The driver can override the stop, and wait until the train is clear of the tunnel.

(Or the scenario where a crowded train going from Cardiff to Swansea after the Wales/England game gets stopped every few hundred yards by "the boys havin a larf").
 

TEW

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The driver had been instructed that stopping over points was not a good place to stop though, to me that seems incorrect. Surely the only places a train shouldn't stop are in a tunnel or on a viaduct, as they are the places it would be very hard to evacuate the train if needed. Stopping over those points would have been operationally inconvenient but it's not the same as preventing a train on fire stopping in a tunnel.
 

PTF62

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The driver had been instructed that stopping over points was not a good place to stop though, to me that seems incorrect

That is not mentioned in the report.

If it was the case then I would have expected the RAIB to have interviewed the person that gave that incorrect instruction to the driver, and that incorrect instruction to be mentioned as a factor in the report.
 
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