RAIB Investigation: South Devon Railway

For once I agree with you.

 

Ditto (with bells on)

 

It is in the Daily Mirror today, including a photo. That is one very, very lucky lad.

 

While its all well and good saying that - perhaps its right that some of us do post here our shock and dismay that such and event happened in the first place. Only then will people on other lines realise the backlash this will cause.

The coach should never have been in traffic.

I would expect that not just the RAIB are going to visit, but also the HSE, as this has been such a near miss, but while investigations are going to take place which is right and proper, I agree me don't need members of DRAT to form their own conclusions already.

Id hope that other lines immediately review their procedures but find that this would never have been allowed or even that safeguards would have been triggered to prevent the coach from entering traffic.

 

Trouble now it's all over the media, it's going to cast a slur all over the heritage railway movement. Mud sticks & all that.

 

Plus in the "I". Taken very much from the RAIB press release which is just as well.

PH

 

But was it hung up the right way? That should be an RAIB investigation all by itself

 

Totally agree. A classic case of Human Factors related events which, on their own, do not lead to a potential incident, but when taken as part of a chain of events, can lead to fatalities. Thank goodness there were no injuries or fatalities in this case. No way should that coach have been released to service.

 

I am inclined to agree that comment before any full report (and RAIB don't always produce full reports but sometimes more summary recommendations) risks missing key factors. The details so far released do leave as many questions as answers and I fear a lot of people are prejudging what even the RAIB release says are the key questions.

I am sure every heritage railway will already have checked how securely any toilet that is out of use is locked off and what risks might arise if some-one was able to enter. They will also be reviewing procedures for deciding when otherwise serviceable vehicles need to be kept out of traffic due to specific issues and what risk mitigation is needed if they are to be used. I am sure that if the use of the vehicle was to prevent uncomfortable, or even dangerous, overcrowding, then passengers may well have had views on that had the vehicle remained out of use but clearly measures taken to enable safe use did not prevent this incident - the crux of the immediate issue is how this happened, whilst the fact it has will have lead RAIB to examine the other factors their list.

That is probably as far as anyone can take matters at the moment. I could make further comment but it would be speculation and let us see what the RAIB has to say.

Steven

 

As a former C&W man, that coach must have been signed off as fit for service, so that is item one, how and why and under what circumstances
As i see it, the vehicle should have been red carded ,if the intension was to do a temporary fix by locking it out of use, the missing floor should have meant the door being rendered un usable in other words secured in a manner where the door could not be opened, preferably by removal and replacing with a panel screwed into place and thus ensuring the public could not access the door, one option would be to lock the ajoining compartment doors if there was no other option i label saying out of use will get ignored, i had one situation where we had a toilet locket out of use, on a service rake, because of a tank problem i was carrying out an inspection on it found the door unlocked and something staring at me in the pan, yet i had locked it out of use with a BR key the previous week and ensured it was locked.

 

Mods can we maybe get this thread locked too? I have a dreadful feeling this one could go round in circles for a while.

 

There is one thing we don't know is how the door was locked and what the sign on the door said the latter it could have been just ''Toilet out of use'' to ''No unauthorised entry'' and information like this will come out when the RAIB report comes out at a future date.

 

At least it makes a change from the 'holy trinity' of NatPres discussions:
1. "This loco should be painted that colour..."
2. "This railway needs to be reopened. It has loads of potential..." (aka WIBN)
3. "Railway X should..."

 

As has been said, we dont know the full story, it will of course come out in the fullness of time, i just hope that what is recommended is based on common sence, not an knee jerk reaction, OK something clearly went wrong, but lets not get carried away, anyone who does, or has worked in any C&W dept, will tel you there is already volumes of data that has to be kept, inspections that have to be done, and heritage railways are as safe as they can realistically be made when staff and volunteers are following laid down rules .

 

Generally, yes. In this case - surely to be reviewed by RAIB?

 

I don't think the toilet was flushable at the time?

 

This question would take the thread in a totally different direction were this to happen in Oz....

 

It sounds like this conversation is rapidly going down the pan,