Southern Trains major disruption due to conductor rail problem near Clapham Jn 30/04

[OneOffDave]

I bet this lot were pleased with themselves after following the procedures.



http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...rowning-man-3ft-deep-lake-half-boot-deep.html

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...ds-Hampstead-Heath-pond-hottest-day-year.html

This is why the fire service in the UK only lets trained water rescue personnel perform water rescues Failures caused fireman's death

 

[sarahj]

Oh dear, signal issues at Victoria, today went:

Code Red
Code Yellow, getting better
Code Black, oh crap
Code Red, less worse.

I've worked here for 8 years, I've only seen the odd code black, thats now 2 in 8 days. Not Good.

 

[tsr]

Yes, I got stranded* at Victoria for the duration of the second loss of signalling today. Lots of NR folks and staff from all sorts of agencies and manufacturers were quite quick to respond both times - I was told by some fairly well-informed sources that there was a serious recurring power supply system fault, but can't actually 100% confirm that, as such info was "word of mouth". It seems this is by no means at all the whole picture, as a problem with the signalling panels themselves has also been mentioned to me.

Several trains got stuck between Victoria & Selhurst/Balham etc for quite a while, as well as some fairly significant delays on the Southeastern side. I am told Southeastern's service recovery was quite good, but many of those Southern trains which are now running have only been starting to run with any resemblance of punctuality within the last 90mins or so.

Some major stations were also having IT issues, which does seem to have been a problem for passenger info. I can't comment specifically on this as I am not aware that anything further has been made public. Nonetheless, suffice to say that this seems to have had an impact on recovering passengers' individual journeys, even though the Control teams did seem to be staying afloat at Southern and have done what, in the circumstances, has not been a half-bad job.

I say this because there were other issues in the morning, including (but not limited to) unit faults at Littlehampton and Hurst Green, a points failure at Hove and a track circuit failure in the New Cross Gate area. All of these have been worked round as well.

*Correct use of the word as I was required to stay there in lieu of anything that could be found which was more useful for me to do.

 

[Southern313]

Tell me about it. My green at Battersea Pier Junction went red just coach and half length before I got to it. No chance of stopping before it, TPWS activation and new underwear time! Lol

 

[sarahj]

I missed most of the issues today, when Hove was down I was working to Lewes and Seaford. Then I was working a Brighton/Southampton/Brighton when Vic went down. Back in SWT land I told folks for London to use SWT from Havant. Got folks for Gatwick off at Barnham as a train was running there right behind, and while the Littlehampton to Vic was only going to the Heath, when we got to Brighton the first trains were heading all the way up to Vic, so got the folks on them. And yes, Control seemed on the ball, no big gaps in messages, info coming through. Though of course I did not have to contact them today.

 

[GodAtum]

Oh dear, signal issues at Victoria, today went:

Code Red
Code Yellow, getting better
Code Black, oh crap
Code Red, less worse.

I've worked here for 8 years, I've only seen the odd code black, thats now 2 in 8 days. Not Good.

What are the criteria for the different codes?

 

[455driver]

What are the criteria for the different codes?

Yellow- oops that's a problem.
Red- aaahhh b-ll-x.
Black- oh f--k, lets go home and try again tomorrow.

That about covers it!

 

[hwl]

BBC article elaborating slightly on Tom Edwards's previous tweets:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-32607610

Rail chaos that left commuters trapped on a train for five hours and disrupted thousands more was caused by an engineering mistake, Network Rail said.

The problem between Wandsworth Common and Clapham Junction caused the suspension of trains in and out of Victoria last Thursday.

Network Rail said it believed the conductor rail - which supplies electricity to trains - was not put back in place after engineering work.

...

In a statement, Network Rail said: "We believe that track repairs carried out the previous evening, which required the conductor rail to be temporarily removed while the repairs took place, may have caused this to happen.

"A formal investigation into the circumstances surrounding this hugely disruptive incident will be carried out and we will make sure that lessons are learned.

 

[Taunton]

...and we will make sure that lessons are learned...

Ah, another "lessons learned" statement, to add to all the previous ones. It's becoming as repetitive as London Underground telling the queued masses that there is a "good service".

"Jones Minor. Write out 500 times 'I must put all the rails back at the end of works' ".

 

[ChiefPlanner]

Southern (and NR) ran an almost perfect service this morning - a few short forms as a result of dislocated stock from yesterday ....much credit.

Then there was a person under a train at Angmering ...

 

[455driver]

Ah, another "lessons learned" statement, to add to all the previous ones.

Yeah I am sick of listening to the same old bullsh um spin!

 

[Peter Mugridge]

What I don't get is that first we were told there were up to 50 carriages damaged; now we are told the rail was not even in place. I can easily understand a misplaced rail damaging the pick up shoes, but cannot see how damage would be caused if there was no rail in place.

If the rail was not in place at all, were these carriages in fact damaged at all or did the trains all simply gap themselves the next time the conductor rail changed sides?

 

[carriageline]

Did they say it was not in place? I thought I read it was installed incorrectly (might be wrong though)

But if a ramp peice wasn't put back in, if the next peice is just straight then surely the shoe would smash into it?

I know nothing about how 3rd rail is installed mind you!

 

[RichardN]

Presumably, if a section had been pulled off to one side, then at the end of the works, the conductor could quite easily sheer off shoe gear when the rail regained the correct alignment.

 

[broadgage]

What I don't get is that first we were told there were up to 50 carriages damaged; now we are told the rail was not even in place. I can easily understand a misplaced rail damaging the pick up shoes, but cannot see how damage would be caused if there was no rail in place.

If the rail was not in place at all, were these carriages in fact damaged at all or did the trains all simply gap themselves the next time the conductor rail changed sides?

If the conductor rail was indeed completely missing, then trains should be able to coast for the short distance involved and no damage would be caused by the missing rail in itself.
The problem would occur when the train encountered properly fixed conductor rail after the missing section. This would almost certainly have a square end onto which the missing section should have been bolted. This would knock off or break the pick up shoes, and might displace the correctly fixed conductor rail, thereby adding to problems.
When there is INTENDED to be an end to the conductor rail, this is ramped in order that the pick up shoes may gently slide into the proper place.

 

[Yabbadabba]

I'm not saying that this is what happened in this case as no exact details have been said within this forum.

But from observations when they have had to cut out and remove a damaged section of running rail then replace it and re-welded that back into place and it adjacent to the conductor rail. They don't usually remove the conductor as well but in stead jack it up out of it pots and slew it temporary to the side out of the way to allow them to work. If this was done that night then there is the poosiblity that when the work was completed and the conductor rail was replaced back onto its pots that a section of was accidentally still left high and wide to gauge. If indeed this was the case then that would do a good job of ripping the shoes and shoe gear from that side of passing trains, hence some with just missing shoes and other with a little more (or a lot more) damage to the traction collection sestem.

 

[sarahj]

The issue with lessons learned is that if it is learned, then you hear no more about it, as the lesson has been learned. If it goes wrong again, the lesson might have been learned, but the solution might have been the wrong one and another solution would need to be looked at.

I'll give an example:

A few years in bad weather we had a few stranded trains, some kept in the dark. Lesson would be learned. As a result a working group was set up and came up with plans to implement. Summer came and went and the plans were ready. The next winter was not as bad, but one train did get stranded. One issue found was how to get the supplies to a train stuck in winter in the middle of nowhere. To that part of the learning was not 100% However each train now has a little box of foil blankets, glow sticks etc. ready for use. However since last winter was more damp and windy, there use has not been needed. But a lesson has been learned.

Again, a few years ago there were issues with stranded trains, or trains stuck in hot weather. A lesson learned was to keep large supplies of bottled water at key stations. Its not easy getting them to folks, but the stories do tell of police and emergency services turning up with water. They had to get them from somewhere. I've also seen them being handed out when delayed trains arrive at stations.

The main lesson to be learned here is to get someone in a senior role to make a decision. And to have a system that backs them up, so if it turns out to be the wrong one, they are not crucified too much by folks who would not make one, but are happy to tell others how they are wrong. But in todays media all over the place and comments on twitter, can I see this happening. No.
And when knowone can even make a decision on what train should leave a station first due to who is going to have to pay delays fees, then perhaps, well....

 

[sbt]

In the MOD we now collect 'Lessons Identified'. They only become 'Lessons Learnt' once you have done something about them.

 

[Peter Mugridge]

Did they say it was not in place? I thought I read it was installed incorrectly (might be wrong though)

But if a ramp piece wasn't put back in, if the next piece is just straight then surely the shoe would smash into it?

Yes, there was a NR bloke on the BBC London local news on Friday ( I think ) specifically saying the rail was missing. I think the exact words were that a section of the conductor rail had not been replaced. That won't be verbatim as I rely on the live subtitling when watching the news and the subtitles are about as reliable as something bought off Arthur Daley.

Thinking about it, a missing end section would cover both given reasons wouldn't it? It's missing, and the rail has also been installed incorrectly.

 

[SpacePhoenix]

If the ramp section was missing, why wouldn't it have been noticed a lot earlier in the day?