Hi Mike,all,
Just read this,what the hell is going on?The regional train hitting the MOW in Germany,..... Now this!

Dr D

BBC news (English)

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-17799940

It look serious damage and could be withdrawn and scrapped. What type of Electric loco is use with it?

Thanks, Paul.

Update:

One woman,age 68,died in hospital.
16 people still in hospital.
Cause of collision still not known.

Paul.

Thanks for the news.

TV news tonight reported that the Sprinter local train ignored a red signal.
The intercity had right of way but did not follow its usual path,it was redirected to another track because of maintenance to track being carried out,as such it encountered the local train on its path.
Had it followed the track always designated it would have passed the local train without consequences.
Apparently,the driver of the local train simply followed daily routine,she never realised that a signal could turn red at that specific point.
Looking at myself,how often do we drive by car the same route every day,excercising the same routine handlings,without actually being aware of possible unexpected disruptions in such routine?

As a consequence of this tragic accident,our minister of transport announced today that a new train safety system will be implemented as soon as possible,or as an old dutch saying goes: "Only after the calf has drowned in the waterhole,we will fill the waterhole up with earth".

The two trains have been towed away and railtraffic to/from Amsterdam resumed to normal service again.

The fact diggers of the press are saying that in 2010 red signals were ignored 172 times,majority of which was without consequences because the automatic train steering stopped these trains in time.
Note that on the total number of departures the number is very minor,but still holding a serious risk.

Paul.

Edited by user 25 April 2012 20:53:41(UTC)  | Reason: Not specified

Too bad. We just had something similar happen in Canada, although I think the lights were covered with snow in a snow storm.

That aside, damage to rail cars will be different with probably more damage done on newer cars than older ones. I would guess that the newer cars are lighter but probably have less injuries as the cars absorbed more impact. Sometimes engineers design for this in mind.

Look at the newer unibody automobiles as compared to the old solid frame automobiles. The old frames did not get as much damaged in collisions but I think that there were more funerals...

Did the article mention there are about 3.26 million train and shunting movements each year?
that results in one in 20,375 train and shunting movements passes a signal at danger, which compares very favourably to how many busses run orange lights turning red on my bike to uni each day...
This link to the Beneluxspoor.net forum has everything in more detail:
http://forum.beneluxspoor.net/index.php/topic,43892.msg701265.html#msg701265

Cheers,
Rick

Passing a signal at danger does put your life and your train at risk, but enginemen(and women) take passing a red signal very seriously, and we cannot conclude that the driver was at fault for the accident until the investigations finish. It could be a case of signal malfunction for all we know. Until then, it's all speculation.

In any case, I curious to see what actually went wrong, and what will happen after the press and political hype settles down.

Being a member of Beneluxspoor.net, I can tell you that the great majority of topics are pretty well behaved, and there is some very good stuff on there, although on topics like these there are a few people that can get carried away a bit.

Cheers,
Rick

It wouldn't surprise me Paul, I was born there after all

Cheers,
Rick

Rinus,

That is your opinion,and i have mine.

Paul.

Haven't been here since the accident, so a late reply:

As far as I have understood the accident happened at a location that is due to be upgraded to a higher-level security system that stops any train that ignores a red signal (the upgrade was planned for many locations years ago, but for reasons of cost stretched over a long period). The existing system only automatically stops a train that ignores a red signal if its speed is above 40 km/h (there will have been a reason for that in the past), so there have been a number of incidents in recent years where trains at <40 km/h ignored a stop signal and caused an accident. Thanks to that relatively low speed the damage is relatively limited too.

Jeroen

Hello,
Thanks for updating this topic.
Nice to have a comprehensive thread about this sad event.
Something the general info media would not do (always hunting for the hotest piece of news).
I am not sure if it is still the case, I believe that disregarding a red light is (was?) allowed, provided the train driver kept going at a very low pace.
The idea behind that rule being to prevent a train stopped to be hit from behind.
In other words clearing the stopping section, to live it free for an eventual following train.
In days where radio not to mention GSM did not exist there were phone box next to the signals for drivers to signal that they had stopped their train past the red light.

Just an humble imput to explain that a red light on the side of a rail track is somehow very different than one on the side of a road where we assume that next car arriving from behind is gonna stop before smashing into our rear bumper. ;-)
That said not to excuse this lady driver.

Claude, From what I have read here and there, there are places where you can pass a signal at danger, although the reasons and conditions are a little diffrent.

Railway signals are set up in such a way that if a train occupies a section of track, the signal at the beginning of the section will always be at danger(i.e red) ruling out the possibility of a train running into the back of another one if the trains obey signals.

There are two categories of signals; automatic and manual signals. The former normally work without any outside intervention, and it is these signals that can be passed at danger under special circumstances(stop in front of the signal and proceed at low speed from memory). In a station signals are manualy controlled, and these cannot be passed at danger without permission from the train controller.

As the accident happend in a station, the train would not have been allowed to pass the signal.

Note that this is what I have picked up here and there, for the exact ruling I would have to read the NS rulebook.

Cheers,
Rick