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It's too early to draw any conclusions over yesterday's train crash near Hatfield, but it is possible to look at similar crashes and speculate a bit. It's unlikely to have been caused by a mistake by the driver or signalling staff. More likely is a fault in the track, a fault on the train or vandalism. Track faults caused the derailment at Hither Green (London) in the 1960s in which 49 people died and the derailment at Bushey (London) in the 1980s in which, despite derailment at 100mph, nobody was seriously hurt or killed. Train faults are a rare event, but one did derail a train at nearby Sandy in the 1990s, with no casualties and one caused a derailment at West Ealing (London) in the 1970s, with 10 deaths. Vandalism is a growing menace, which the legal establishment does not seem to take very seriously. Perhaps they will do so when a serious crash takes place with large loss of life. So far in the UK the worst case of direct vandalism was the derailment of a train at Prestonpans (by Edinburgh) in the 1970s, with no deaths. Vandalism of fences was also the root cause of the derailment at Polmont in the 1980s, with 13 deaths.
When a crash does take place the number of injuries does not seem to bear much relationship to the type of crash. At Bushey several coaches were thrown on their sides at 100mph then hit a platform. The worst damage was that some panes of glass in the windows were broken. Nobody was seriously hurt, though the experience will live with those involved for the rest of their life. In the apparently similar crash at Hatfield there have been several deaths. What is clear is that if coaches are badly damaged in a crash, so that passengers can fall out, then the number of injuries and fatalities rises. Modern coaches are very strong, as Bushy demonstrated, but it is impossible to make a coach that will survive any crash without a scratch.
The causes of train crashes are varied, so it's not easy to pick one cause. It is also not possible to give sound bite answers about what can be done. The main cause of many crashes recent decades has been drivers passing signals at danger, which is far more complicated than saying the driver made a mistake. As a result the railways are installing a system called TPWS to reduce the incidence of this and apply the brakes when it does happen. The line from London to Glasgow is going to be the first large scale trial of a European standard Train Control System, which incorporates the Automatic Train Protection system that has been much talked about recently. Other things cause train crashes, these are managed by the railways as much as possible, but nobody has yet achieved perfection.
British railways have a good safety record, but like any other human endeavour things go wrong from time to time. Lessons are learnt from crashes and the railways will learn from this one. There is on British railways a signalling system called "Welwyn control", this was introduced after a crash at Welwyn Garden City, not far from yesterday's crash. Railway crashes are news because they are so rare. 10 people a day are killed on the roads and only the friends and family seem to care. Society in general does not care for all these victims. The double standards are worrying.
Editor's note:
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