Dispatching a train in the dark under DOO

[TurbostarFan]

From your replies I can only assume you are a driver or someone else who works in the industry.

Thanks for your advice. As a driver myself I will continue to communicate mainly through the signaller for such situations. I do call control for certain things, but something such as missing a station which can be classified as a safety of the line incident, I prefer to speak to the signaller, who ultimately has overall authority over any train movements.

Precisely. What is the point of speaking to control as well as the signaller? I personally cannot see any, it will achieve nothing apart from waste control's time as they still have to speak to the signaller anyway.

 

[CertifiedMonk]

Today I was on an early Thameslink train from East Grinstead to London Bridge. At Upper Warlingham the electricity supply to the station had failed so there was no lighting. Being still dark, the platform was very murky. We sat there for some time until the driver announced he could not dispatch the train in the dark and would have to contact Thameslink control. After some delay he announced he would have to perform a "manual dispatch". This saw him locking the doors off and then running the full length of the 12 car set (without a torch!) to ensure nobody was trapped. Despite running to time up until that point, we eventually departed 15 minutes late.

Questions arising from this are:

- Shouldn't the driver know what to do in such a situation without having to contact control?

- With all the sensors and telemetry available on the class 700s, why wouldn't "all doors closed and locked" be sufficient feedback to the driver to allow dispatch, rather than have him run up and down the platform?

Suffice to say the grizzled commuters onboard were somewhat non-plussed by the delay, but I can't recall anything like this ever happened in my 15+ years of commuting.

Any thoughts or opinions?

Certain stations require a dispatcher to dispatch the train , as a conductor if I don't have a dispatcher at manningtree for example and it's dark as it's manned and.no ones turned up I cannot self dispatch I must first contact control to advise then they will advise me you are clear to dispatch and allow for 5-10 Min delay due to checking every door as on my line we have slam door stock MK3 and it's a very curved platform. But yes he must follow protocol, regardless another reason a guard would be helpful in DOO situations such as this.

But you get the idea no visibility for the driver so he decides to close the doors and drive on and someone snitches him up then it will be investigated. that's why on the railway always follow protocol and safe working

 

[TurbostarFan]

Certain stations require a dispatcher to dispatch the train , as a conductor if I don't have a dispatcher at manningtree for example and it's dark as it's manned and.no ones turned up I cannot self dispatch I must first contact control to advise then they will advise me you are clear to dispatch and allow for 5-10 Min delay due to checking every door as on my line we have slam door stock MK3 and it's a very curved platform. But yes he must follow protocol, regardless another reason a guard would be helpful in DOO situations such as this.

But you get the idea no visibility for the driver so he decides to close the doors and drive on and someone snitches him up then it will be investigated. that's why on the railway always follow protocol and safe working

As for that scenario, you would never get a slam door train operating without a guard onboard for that reason.

I feel that the words "snitches him up" are a bit harsh. Maybe "reports him to his TOC" would be a better form of wording, the reason being that such a serious and flagrant breach of protocol is something serious which you definitely shouldn't turn a blind eye to.

 

[sarahj]

With a 3 car 313 on a stopper with a conductor on a Seaford working - absolutely - dwell as much time as is needed to allow people safely off the platform using the train lights and most people will be happy and reasonably safe.

Any train relying on using D.O.O. in cab images and the can of worms you open is a catering size can. As has been touched on, the lighting at stations where on board cameras are used is set at quite stringently applied levels so degraded despatch will almost certainly consist of a walk back at the very least.

With a 12 car and an OBS not despatch qualified, that's a lot of dwell time on any route with a busy service to have a significant impact.

Some locations with mirrors and platform monitors muddy these instructions even further, not least of course because a power failure may shut off platform mounted monitors. Ambient light and local knowledge plays a huge part and most importantly, Safety has always been at the back of my mind in the literally hundreds of times I have had to "make a shout" about these scenarios.

That problem rests on others shoulders these days.

Yup, Southease, no lights. Announcement beforehand. Wait on the platform just a bit longer, torch at the ready to guide folks off the platform. Final shine up and down the train to make sure. Off you go.