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Author Topic: Ladbroke Grove (Paddington) train crash - 5 Oct 1999 - anniversaries, memories and publications  (Read 31374 times)
eightf48544
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« Reply #30 on: November 11, 2009, 10:48:46 »

Two major facts were excluded from most media reports on the Ladbroke Grove collision, following a train passing a signal at danger. 

    In normal railway practice, where one running line joins another, there is a set of trap points (or derailer) which diverts an errant train away from the route it would otherwise have taken.  Such trap points would be followed by a sand drag into which the train would plough and come to a very sudden but, depending on its speed, relatively safe halt.  There were no such trap points (or derailer) at the end of the line controlled by Signal 109, either because they had never been installed, or they had been removed to save the maintenance cost of such a once universal safety feature. 

    On 23rd June 1999 at Winsford, Cheshire a train on a slow line passed a red signal, ran onto a fast line and was hit in the rear by another train ^ because there were no trap points at the end of the slow line.  In this collision, just months before Ladbroke Grove, no one was killed or badly injured.

    Both at Winsford and at Ladbroke Grove, the presence of such points would have averted the collisions

    The other piece of normal railway practice missing was the way the facing points immediately beyond Signal 109 were set when 109 was at red.  Had they been reversed to take any down train passing the signal at danger onto the track to the right ^ which was also a down line ^ then no head on collision would have been possible.  As at Winsford, the worst that could have happened would have been two trains going the same way colliding.

    Another question concerns the failure of the driver of the down train to respond to three AWS (Automatic Warning System) (Automatic Warning System) alarms before accelerating past Signal 109.  The driver of the train that passed 109 at red would have heard and cancelled those three warning horns telling him the signals he was approaching were at caution or danger.  Instances of unconsciously cancelling AWS (and its decades old GWR (Great Western Railway) predecessor Automatic Train Control) warnings are legion; that is why ATP (Automatic Train Protection) (Automatic Train Protection) ^ which cannot be over-ridden in the same way ^ has now been installed on most if not all trains, even preserved steam engines, running on the national network.

    As in most railway accidents, it was human errors that led to the Ladbroke Grove crash.  Whilst some of those errors occurred on the day, others were built into the system waiting to be part of it.  Even a fully automatic railway would still have been designed by humans.


I agree whole heartedly with Bulliver Ladbroke Grove was the most avoidable head-on collison  in British railway history.

To add to his summary there are a set of points 8059 B (now 9000) situated several hundred yards beyond Signal SN109 leading to the down relief, to give flank protection.  Which Cullen shamefully dodged in his report. These were set for the Up Main thus once the SPAD (Signal Passed At Danger) had occurred and the train was running away i.e out of control of fixed signals, it led inevitatably to the high speed head on collision on the Up Main. That's why SN109 was at danger because a train was coming up Line 2 which prevented the Turbo crossing from Line 3 to the Down Main.

Secondly there had been a dress rehersal 18 months before 6th Spad 14/2/98  where an HST (High Speed Train) passed SN109 at danger but fortunately stopped 400 plus yards beyond.  The IECC (Integrated Electronic Control Centre) was able to stop an Up Heathrow express on the Up Main. I believe the trains stopped some 200 yards apart. I was caught up in this because our train had to back into Padd to clear the line for the HST to come back. It was reported in the press as a near head collision. Unfortunately the I didn't believe the"headon bit" as I had assummed that 8059B would have been set for the Down Releif with SN120 at green for Line 2 and Sn109 at red for Line 3. Had I realised that the "headon" wasn't press hype I think I would have written to HMRI (Her Majesty's Railway Inspectorate) asking why. At least my concerns would have been available to the Cullen report if nothing had been done.

My own speculation  is that it was the low sun shining onto the route indicator at SN109 that caused the Turbo driver to assumme the SN109 was showing a proceed aspect. At that time SN109 was an L shaped signal (non standard) with the red aspect to left of the lower yellow aspect at the same level, the green and second yellow were above the first yellow. Immediately to the left again was the route indcator showing DM or DR in white lights.  I think he mistook the overall whiteout caused by the low  sun to mean that the indicator wa showing a route and therefore SN109 was showing a proceed aspect.

Which could explain why he cancelled the AWS for Sn109 he assummed that it had changed to yellow.
I've looked back going into to Padd at SN109 before the changes to the new signals and seen the route indicator showing overall white in the low sun. I usually couldn't see the aspect becuse I was on line 6.

It was also the 9th SPAD at Sn109. 9 SPADS at one signal would have been unheard of in BR (British Rail(ways)) days without something being done. Usually by ASLEF» (Associated Society of Locomotive Engineers and Firemen - about) demanding something be done because they were fed up with their drivers getting the blame for something being seriously wrong with the signal sighting. Unfortunately there is a school of thought which says it doesn't matter where we put signals drivers must obey them irrespective of how badly they are placed in relation to sighting distances etc. The other more traditional school tends to say lets put them in the best place and provide a track layout beyond the signal which avoids at least a head on collision if a driver SPADS and runs away.

The "running away" is not often mentioned most accidents are caused not by the SPAD as such but by the driver not realising he's SPAD and continuing to run. Most SPADS are a run  by caused by the driver misjugding his braking and the train stops within the safety margin beyond the signal.

Thanks Bulliver for your post.
« Last Edit: November 11, 2009, 12:05:46 by eightf48544 » Logged
Tim
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« Reply #31 on: November 11, 2009, 13:24:27 »

Unfortunately there is a school of thought which says it doesn't matter where we put signals drivers must obey them irrespective of how badly they are placed in relation to sighting distances etc.

There is of course a risk from universal adoption of ATP (Automatic Train Protection) in that the signal people start to think that poor sighting and no flank protection is OK because it is impossible to SPAD (Signal Passed At Danger).  That is fine if ATP is really universal and is always used and always works, but as we know GW (Great Western)-ATP can be switched off with deadly consequences, so I'd be reluctant to see traditional methods of mitigating risk (ie sensible signal sighting and layouts) abandoned. 

Of course the later stages of ERTM do away with lineside signals completely.  Drivers will have no choice but to compeletly trust the technology.   

Thanks for your Post
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IndustryInsider
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« Reply #32 on: November 11, 2009, 13:33:35 »

There is of course a risk from universal adoption of ATP (Automatic Train Protection) in that the signal people start to think that poor sighting and no flank protection is OK because it is impossible to SPAD (Signal Passed At Danger)

Even with ATP it is quite easy to still have a SPAD - albeit at lower speeds only.
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Chris from Nailsea
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« Reply #33 on: November 11, 2009, 20:45:13 »

I expect the Cullen Report covers it, it'll be online somewhere ...

Indeed: the various reports arising from Ladbroke Grove (including Part 1 and Part 2 of the Cullen report) are available on the website of the Office of Rail Regulation.
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« Reply #34 on: September 17, 2011, 11:48:44 »

This has just been posted on WNXX (Stored Unserviceable, Mainline Locos HQ All Classes):

http://www.radiotimes.com/episode/mxfmd/seconds-from-disaster-paddington-train-collision

 I think this is the Lambroke grove accident if i am right?

Sadly i dont have national geographic so i cant watch it although i may do so if it appears on youtube. This should be good if the previous episodes are anything to go by.

I am sorry if this is posted in the wrong place i just couldnt decide where to post it.
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ChrisB
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« Reply #35 on: September 17, 2011, 12:37:14 »

Ladbroke Grove?
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anthony215
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« Reply #36 on: September 17, 2011, 14:49:49 »

Sorry, for that i have always called it lambroke grove
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6 OF 2 redundant adjunct of unimatrix 01
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« Reply #37 on: September 17, 2011, 14:51:52 »

you may want to read this

http://www.rail-reg.gov.uk/upload/pdf/incident-ladbrokegrove-lgri1-optim.pdf
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bobm
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« Reply #38 on: March 04, 2014, 18:45:25 »

From GetReading

Quote


Paddington rail crash survivor Pam Warren has written a book about her fight for survival
 
Reading Post features editor Caroline Cook hears her extraordinary story

Pam Warren is a woman who has defied the odds.
 
When a fireball ripped through the first class train carriage she was sitting in at 8.11am on October 5, 1999, the chances of her survival were slim.
 
Minutes later as she was crawling underneath the wreckage of the Thames Train and First Great Western which had collided, with diesel dripping on her head, the future looked impossible.
 
And as doctors battled to heal her burns in Charring Cross hospital they couldn't be sure Pam would make it through.
 
But she did.
 
Pam Warren is a survivor.
 
Now 47, and living in Pangbourne, Pam has told her incredible story in a new book From Behind The Mask, in which she speaks candidly about the crash which changed her life.
 
Pam was just 32-years-old when she boarded the London bound First Great Western at Reading. A financial advisor living in Bradfield South End and working for her own company, she was living the high life, swapping the latest BMW for a Mercedes after a year and enjoying a 'work hard, play hard' lifestyle.
 
She was studying for her advanced financial certificate and on her way to a training day, which fatefully, had been moved to London from the Thames Valley because there were not enough people from the area attending.

"It was a cold, crisp, blue sky day and I remember standing on the platform with my eyes closed thinking 'gosh, this day is lovely'," says Pam.
 
The train pulled up and carriage H, the first class carriage, stopped just in front of her.
 
"I remember thinking that's lucky," she says with a sombre smile.
 
After taking her seat opposite a man who, unknown to her then, was Keith Stiles of West Reading, she did a bit of paperwork before sitting back and watching the world go by.
 
"Then we got to Ladbroke Grove and I always remember that it was the screeching first of all," she says. "For a second I thought someone has pulled the emergency cord. It was that sharp, grinding metal on metal sound.
 
"Just as I was thinking that, I must have looked at Keith, and I realised I was looking down at him. Both of us registered it. His face and my face, and it must have just been a look of 'oh my God'.
 
"That was when I realised something was wrong."
 
The Thames Train which had left Paddington Station at 8.06am had collided nearly head on with the First Great Western at a combined speed of 130mph.
 
Thirty-one people lost their lives and 400 were injured.
 
"It was just mayhem," continues Pam. "The carriage started bucking all over the place, we were being knocked around and it went dark. "There were brief cases falling down and all I could think of doing was grabbing hold of the seat and making myself small.
 
"That's when I looked over my shoulder and saw the fireball. It was probably only a second but it was enough for me to think 'I'm dead'."
 
The fireball tore through the carriage, leaving Pam with excruciating burns to her hands, face and legs.
 
"It did look like a movie special effect," she recalls. "I remember seeing yellow and orange and black and it was making this God almighty noise. I remember hearing men screaming which still upsets me.
 
"I had my hands up while it was going over and I have never been able to describe the heat. It's just impossible."
 
Immediately after the fireball had passed through Pam says there was a quiet in the carriage.
 
"I took my hands down and didn't realise how badly burnt I was. My leg had gone over the edge of the seat so it took the force of the burning, and it was still on fire.
 
"I put my hands down to put it out. Then I was over come by panic and thought 'I have to get out'."
 
Heaving herself out of a broken window Pam escaped from the wreckage, finding herself trapped in the middle of the 'v' shape with the two trains on either side.
 
Another survivor who had come from the buffet cart, helped her crawl under the Thames Train to safety.
 
"I think you go into survival mode. I think panic or getting upset or even registering hurt is ignored. Your brain goes 'I have got to survive'.
 
Sitting on the side of the tracks, Pam was comforted by other survivors who sprinkled water on her hands and hid the horror of her injuries from her. She would later be mistaken for another survivor, Evelyn, at the hospital, who had given Pam a jacket with her own ID badge in it.
 
After the ambulances arrived Pam was hoisted up out of the crash site on a pulley system, to a car park where survivors where being gathered.
 
"I remember, again just for a second, taking in the train crash, all those bodies laying around and my brain just went 'don't take it in, you have enough to deal with'. I shut it out."
 
Following the crash Pam was in a coma for three weeks while doctors added skin grafts to her hands and face. Although unconscious, Pam's survival instinct seemed to kick in and she continued to defy the odds.
 
"There was a bit of a scare because I was still in intensive care and there was some sort of virus going round," says Pam.
 
"If I got an infection on my wounds that could have seen me off. I caught double pneumonia too. I was not supposed to pull through."
 
She then spent another three months in hospital, undergoing painful physiotherapy and trying to come to terms with what had happened.
 
"They said I would probably get about 50 per cent usage back in my hands but I had to work hard.
 
"It took two hours to get the bandages off then when I saw why hands it was shocking. They didn't look like hands. It was like something out of a horror movie. But I had to do it. Even with the pain, I wanted more than 50 per cent."
 
It was more than a month after the crash that Pam saw her face for the first time.
 
"My doctor Nick [Percival] came up one evening and said, 'have you looked at your face?'," she recalls. "I said no, and he said 'you have to, and the time is coming close'.
 
"I waited until the next day when my family were not there and I went into my bathroom and I remember looking down the sink and there was a mirror and I gradually lifted my face to look at myself.
 
"I was horrified. It was just a mess. Even after six weeks it still was a mess. I just started crying.
 
"Afterwards when anyone came into my room I thought 'what must they be looking at'. That's when I started trying to hide my face, more so I didn't upset them."
 
It was her surgeon, Nick, who first suggested wearing the plastic mask which would help her skin to heal but would also become an iconic image of the crash.
 
Pam had been called as a witness to an inquiry into the crash and the day after her photo was on the front page of every newspaper. She became known as 'the women in the mask'.
 
"I went in on myself and refused to talk," she says, adding although she wasn't comfortable with the attention drawn by the mask, she realised it's importance.
 
"If the plastic mask needed to be the focus then that was it. It helped enormously in our campaign," she says.
 
In the wake of the crash Pam formed the Paddington Survivors Group to offer support to those who had been effected. The group took on greater significance as it successfully campaigned for better rail safety, helping to transform rail safety standards.
 
Although her work with the group was a focus in the months immediately after she came out of hospital, eventually the memories of the crash took over, and Pam stepped down in 2004.
 
She began having horrific nightmares of the crash but tried to hide them from anyone else until it all became too much, and she tried to take her own life.
 
"The suicide attempt happened when the nightmares and flashbacks were becoming overwhelming and I didn't ask for help," she says.
 
"As a result of it I had to have my stomach pumped and they wouldn't let me out of the Royal Berks until I was going to get help. I went to a clinic for people with psychiatric problems."
 
In her book Pam also talks briefly about the breakdown of her marriage, which happened several years after the crash.
 
Although she doesn't want to talk expressly about it, she says: "This is generic, but if you have a strong marriage and something like this happens you are going to work your way through. There must have been something wrong beforehand."
 
The nightmares and flashbacks she suffered in the years following the crash also triggered a period of alcoholism.
 
"I was having panic attacks and I didn't admit it to anyone," says Pam. "I was trying to cope and hardly sleeping. I started turning to alcohol to put me to sleep. I started with one or two glasses then a bottle and so on.
 
"That's a period of my life I'm very ashamed of. It is not who I am now or who I was before."
 
It was a meeting with Falklands war hero Simon Weston, through charity The Healing Foundation, of which both Pam and Simon are ambassadors, that helped turn things around.
 
"I went to visit him at his home in Cardiff and he said 'what would you like to drink?'. I asked if he had a glass of wine, but now I think he meant tea or coffee. He looked at me and started asking questions and he said, 'do you NEED a glass of wine?'.
 
"Admitting my problem to him was not as hard as it would have been to others. He was a relative stranger and I had a huge respect for him and he turned round and said 'Oh Pam, I have been there and done that'.
 
"To know it had happened to someone like that, I blurted everything out."
 
After putting that difficult period behind her Pam threw herself into work with The Healing Foundation, which works to support people living with disfigurement, and The Dame Kelly Holmes Legacy Trust which is committed to getting young lives back on track.
 
She works in project management and although not formally campaigning for rail safety, she still raises issues with the rail networks if people get in touch with concerns.
 
"Nothing can be 100 per cent safe," she says. "It's physically impossible. You have to accept there is a risk to catching a train, even I know that and I'm catching them now.
 
"But to me there is a level of unacceptable risk which is what was happening back then. If I stop catching the train, and I know a lot more about it than most, then people should be worried."
 
After travelling on a train in 2009 for the first time since the crash, during an appearance on Tonight with Trevor Macdonald, Pam now uses trains occasionally.
 
She some times travels to Paddington, always accompanied by a friend who assists her in the event of panic attacks which occur at times.
 
October 5, 1999 is a day which will always be part of Pam, she still has flashbacks of the crash and has to cope with the physical effects and Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.
 
But after everything she has been through, the Pam Warren today has a smile on her face.
 
"Writing my book has been helpful but mostly I have done it because this is my way of saying life is wonderful and don't give up.
 
"I didn't feel right writing it any earlier because I wanted to put hand on heart and say I am definitely through this, and I am."
 
From Behind the Mask by Pam Warren is published by Biteback Publishing on March 4.
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trainer
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« Reply #39 on: March 04, 2014, 22:33:26 »

I found this very moving to read.  Thank you for posting it.
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ChrisB
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« Reply #40 on: March 05, 2014, 11:02:44 »

^13.89 atr present from the publishers

https://www.bitebackpublishing.com/books/from-behind-the-mask-hardback
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« Reply #41 on: October 05, 2014, 15:48:44 »

From the BBC» (British Broadcasting Corporation - home page):

Quote
Paddington rail disaster remembered 15 years on

Those bereaved by the Paddington train crash have marked the 15th anniversary of the disaster with a ceremony.

They have placed flowers at a memorial site high above the railway line at Ladbroke Grove in west London.

Just before 08:10 BST on 5 October 1999, 31 people died when two trains collided almost head-on.

The subsequent inquiry found the Thames Trains service travelling from Paddington to Bedwyn in Wiltshire had gone through a red signal.

It then crashed into the London-bound high-speed First Great Western train which had left Cheltenham Spa in Gloucestershire at 06:03.

The Thames driver, Michael Hodder, 31, and the other train driver, Brian Cooper, 52, were among those killed as the collision led to a fireball in which coach H was burnt out.

As well as the fatalities, more than 220 people were injured.

'Lives changed'

Paddington Survivors group chairman Jonathan Duckworth, 56, from Stroud in Gloucestershire, was on the First Great Western train.

Father-of-two Mr Duckworth said: "Luckily, I was only in hospital for around 24 hours but then I suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder.

"I had to have about 18 months of treatment and was only able after that to take on small, part-time jobs.

"It was six or seven years before I was able to work full-time again."

The Paddington disaster was followed by fatal rail crashes at Hatfield in Hertfordshire in 2000, at Selby in North Yorkshire in 2001 and at Potters Bar in Hertfordshire in 2002.

Michael Roberts, director-general of the Rail Delivery Group, which speaks on behalf of Network Rail and the train operators, said: "We remember those who lost their lives and all those whose lives were changed as a result of the Paddington crash.

"After serious accidents in the early 2000s, changes such as an overhaul of employee training for those doing safety-critical jobs and a better approach to staff working hours have helped improve safety on Britain's railway."
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« Reply #42 on: October 05, 2014, 16:04:58 »

Used to work with a lady who was travelling pass on that fateful HST (High Speed Train), hearing her story always put me on edge for a few days.

Unfortunate typo in the GetReading article though regarding the name of the hospital.   Sad
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« Reply #43 on: October 05, 2014, 16:37:54 »

As I have mentioned before, I too am a survivor of that crash. Travelling in the first coach to stay upright and seated backwards my physical injuries were very minor, but it was not an experience that is easy to think about, even after this time.

All that week I had been on the next train (7:35 from Didcot). That day I happened to get to the station just a little bit earlier.
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« Reply #44 on: October 05, 2014, 18:44:40 »

I remember the morning well.  I was undertaking a business trip to America that day and was staying overnight at a hotel in London.  I now work in London and I walk pass this same hotel on my way back to Paddington for my evening commute.  At that time, the Heathrow Express had just started and the airlines had check-in desks at Paddington Station in the area that is now the shops ^ Yo Sushi! bar, M & S, etc. I checked my luggage in there and caught the HEX to Heathrow where some hours later I caught my flight to Chicago.

On arrival there after U.S. immigration, I was waiting in the baggage hall for my luggage when I heard my name being called over the Tanoy ^ never a good sign.  I made myself known and was told my bags had not made it to Chicago.  ^How?^, I protested. I had checked them in three hours before boarding at Paddington.

^Have you not heard about the train wreck?^, I was asked. ^What train wreck?^, I replied.

It was the days before mobile internet.  I had heard nothing at Heathrow and had to wait to get to my final destination before the full horror of the day made itself clear.

Apparently, I was on the last HEX ^ and possibly the very last service of any kind ^ that passed through Ladbroke Grove before the collision that morning.  My bags were on the following HEX and never left Paddington.

Every evening as I walk past The Leonard, I remember that day.
« Last Edit: October 05, 2014, 20:21:22 by Oxonhutch » Logged
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