Great Western Coffee Shop

A freight train has broken down on the relief line just east of Tilehurst station, unfortunately the next train on the up main is also a freight waiting to go towards Reading West, leading to both up lines being blocked.

Flying Scotsman, if she's out, seems to be stuck at Didcot East Jn on the avoiding lines.  Now 15:37 on Up Releif both UP lines seem to be open.

Doubt about Scotsman I was  told it was filature with leaking tubes. RTT shows it as diesel but that may be deliberate.

Interesting to watch on OTT I might wander down to Taplow.

This was Reading platform 12 at about 16h45 on 5th June. Something very leaky, and environmentally unfriendly, had recently passed through in the London direction.  What ever it was, it looked expensive.

Obviously making sure there was plenty of lubrication to the middle cylinder.

Why do you say "in the London direction"?

Oxonhutch appears correct, the failed train passed through P12 at 16:00

It was the direction of spatter that showed movement from right to left

This is beginning to sound a bit like CSI Oxonhutch 😁

A geologist can't help himself working out in which direction things flowed! There's money in that game ...  ;D

I was just wondering whether you did reckon there was enough evidence to track the track on the track*, since the photo isn't that clear. After all, you did know what you were expecting and could have checked what had come out on the data feeds. Obviously you need to assume the train was moving fast enough to overcome any directional ejection of the oil from its source, though that is not unreasonable.

*works in Dutch too, and perhaps other languages

Mx Stuving is casting nasturtiums at my sleuthing abilities - good grief  ;)

I had heard of a breakdown in the Reading area and I did wonder if it had anything to do with the very fresh, and copious, oil spillage along platform 12 normally used by down services - indeed, I was waiting for the down stopper - without having consulted the web. 

The finest evidence of a 'wrong'* direction move was directly in front of me, but was a less dramatic photo in terms of capturing the volume of the spill. There is however one of the tell-tales visible in my photo and I refer the jury to the fifth sleeper from the right, just left of centre: an outstretched hand of a splatter with two slightly diverging fingers pointing away from the camera. It was this asymmetric, divergent distribution of spatter from the larger splat of oil hitting the sleeper that gave the observer an indication of the direction of the fouling train. Throw an egg-cup full of water on the patio to replicate.

I will now submit my invoice at my usual rates.

* I am aware that all the through platforms are signaled bi-directionally

Someone should get to Uffington, apparently there is "oil everywhere" after a pipe ruptured on a freight train this morning.  Fortunately, it terms of disruption, in happened just past the crossovers so trains are able to get past using reversible working over the Up line as far as Bourton just outside Swindon.

Are you absolutely sure that "oil everywhere" is the correct technical term, bobm?

Apparently that was the phrase used by the driver to the signaller.