WCRC - the ongoing battle with ORR.

[Mike_Walker]

12 hours ago, The Stationmaster said:

Mike have a word with Captain Kernow of this parish who found out the hard way that they weren't entirely electrically compatible when they did couple one to t'other.

That was during the early days when regular software updates were being made.  There were regular cases where two 800s wouldn't talk to each other let alone a 800 to a 802.  Last I heard they'd reached about version 80 of the software!

[Nick C]

9 hours ago, Grovenor said:

The prohibition notice in this case does not require CDL. It just requires them to follow their agreed procedure for managing the doors with the bolts they have fitted.

This is the key point that several posters on here seem to be missing - WCRC have a specific exemption from the CDL fitting, which requires them to follow a specific procedure, and they've been caught not doing so.

 

8 hours ago, Morello Cherry said:

I find the 'no one has fallen out the a train so it isn't a issue' arguments insane. Just because something hasn't happened doesn't mean you don't take precautions to stop it because put simply the worst case scenario doesn't bear thinking about.

The same argument I keep trying to make on threads about getting rid of trained staff on board trains (i.e. guards) - "no one has died yet" isn't a valid reason to get rid of a safety feature...

[adb968008]

7 hours ago, phil-b259 said:

Actually IIRC Network Rail did indeed put base another one of their 153 units somewhere along the GEML to act as thunderbird while the modified 153 was doing its survey work in the region precisely because following the delivery of new trains to Grater Anglia there was a lack of 15X units about which could be called upon in the event of a failure.

 

As such it wouldn’t surprise me that an unmodified 153 was dumped at the likes of Selhurst or Tonbridge while the dedicated survey unit was running around about Sussex or Kent to provide a similar contingency - the delay minutes (and thus financial compensation due) from a failure on the BML if the 153 failed would be significant!

 

would make sense.

A quick check today, 950001 is in wales, 153311 moved to Derby last night and 155379 separately moved from Ferme Park to Derby last week.

so i’m not sure that happened this time.

Lsl has 142007 at Eastleigh, maybe that was the rescue plan ?

 

Edited July 25, 2023 by adb968008

[APOLLO]

Wanna lean out of the window, have a fun train ride and be responsible for your own H&S. ? - Go to Thailand !!

 

Beware of thieving monkeys on the drive to the station

 

 

 

Beware of the tablet catchers, trees etc  etc when leaning out !!

 

 

Little station in the jungle. Note the large dropdown windows.

 

 

Nice food also (some of it) !!

 

 

Another world a million miles away.

 

Brit15

 

Edited July 28, 2023 by APOLLO

[adb968008]

7 minutes ago, APOLLO said:

Wanna lean out of the window, have a fun train ride and be responsible for your own H&S. ? - Go to Thailand !!

 

Beware of thieving monkeys on the drive to the station

 

 

Third class, hard seats, fan in roof not working, but the big windows fully open !!

 

 

Beware of the tablet catchers, trees etc  etc when leaning out !!

 

 

Little station in the jungle.

 

 

Nice food also (some of it) !!

 

 

Another world a million miles away.

 

Brit15

 

Love it!

 

Head south.. long way south, rumour has it theres a prototype 141 hiding in the jungle.

 

Are the 158’s still running in Bangkok ?

[lmsforever]

Read an article that covered this part of the world  ,a councillor in Glenfinan  reported that he was concerned about the number of motorists parking badly and just rushing across the road to the viaduct without any regard for their or anyone else's safety.There is to be a complete reappraisal of everything to do with the Highland lines in the near future by the Scottish Government so maybe we will see more trains. The steam service is a very important part of the economy    therefore  they have to upgrade the coaches asap.

[ruggedpeak]

1 hour ago, lmsforever said:

Read an article that covered this part of the world  ,a councillor in Glenfinan  reported that he was concerned about the number of motorists parking badly and just rushing across the road to the viaduct without any regard for their or anyone else's safety.There is to be a complete reappraisal of everything to do with the Highland lines in the near future by the Scottish Government so maybe we will see more trains. The steam service is a very important part of the economy    therefore  they have to upgrade the coaches asap.

Used to be a lot of fatalities on the road next to Eilean Donan Castle near Kyle of Lochalsh as people would park on the side of a 60 mph single carriageway road and cross to see it. Eventually they had to build a proper car park which is what is there now. People on holiday put their brains into neutral and start taking risks that in 'normal' life they either wouldn't do or would do so with far more awareness. That has to be factored in. People go on holiday to take a break, and that often includes a break from keeping themselves safe.

 

As for WCRC, looks like history is repeating itself.

[The Stationmaster]

There's been several mentions in this thread about d risk assessmenrs so t let's consider a gfew points.

 

1. WCRC had produced a method, accepted by the Inspectorate, for dealing with the hazards posed by slam doors.  If that method had been properly arrived at there should have been a risk assessment (RA) to support it.  And the procedure for doing that should be included in their Safety Management System (SMS).    Provided the latter is right up to scratch - but it's all very basic stuff in this day and age so should hardly need teh SMS to tell them that.

 

2. The RA would  (should) have taken into account frequency (=number of trains per day X number of doors on the train) plus incorporation of a factor for the number of passengers per train.

2. It should have included all the potential risks and one of those should have been theh lack of familiarity on the part of passengers with theh hazards posed by slam doors (and leaning out of drop lights - which should also include any tight to gauge spots on the route as particular potential risk)

 

That is one lot of numbers to crunch and they will probably come out in the yellow area but towards the red based on what various people who seem familiar with this operation have said in this thread.

 

3,  The RA also has to take into account potential consequences and they too should ideally be supported by real data.  That too has been mentioned upthread - there is a real risk of death should a person fall out of slam door which is not fully secured by an additional locking method.  That will have been a factor in arriving at the need for CDL in the first place.  The potential consequences are way over to the worst end of the red part of the chart.

 

There is then a need to test any potential mitigations against the conclusions of the RA and it is normally accepted that ALARP is the answer.  In other words the risk potential has to be made as low as reasonably practicable.  The mitigation has to achieve that and at this point consideration can be given, possibly to such matters as cost and other wider implications of all sorts.

 

 Once you have decided (properly and ideally by means of an RA) that there is potential risk and have introduced a mitigation to reduce the potential to ALARP that is it.   You have got your mitigation and - where necessary the ORR's Inspectorate has accepted it - and you apply it..   If however you have clearly decided there is serious potential risk and have produced an effective mitigation which you don't then apply you are knowingly recreating the maximum potential risk.  In risk management terms, and according to the ORR information, the latter is exactly what WCRC have done.

[adb968008]

Why not use a T key to lock the doors and have the steward manage them ?

its a 25-30mph trundle on a sparsely used line afterall.

A Southall style accident is very unlikely.

Edited July 25, 2023 by adb968008

[phil-b259]

2 hours ago, adb968008 said:

Why not use a T key to lock the doors and have the steward manage them ?

 

 

Although a good interim solution (and far better than mere 'garden gate' bolts), it still leaves the situation open to human error should the steward in charge of that door be distracted by passengers at the critical moment - plus if emergency escape was necessary then a T key operated lock could be problematic under certain circumstances.

 

Moreover a manual solution doesn't stop the train from moving - a centrally operated system can be interlocked with the brakes such that if a door is not detected as locked then the train cannot move.

 

A central locking system by contrast puts door releases in the hands of a single person (e.g. the train guard - who by and large will not be expected to be dealing with passengers), prevents the train from moving unless all doors are proved to be locked, while also being able to be released by passengers or emergency services by the use of sealed release (i.e. brake glass type boxes with an override switch) inside the carriage and recessed butterfly switches suitably mounted on the outside.

[Michael Hodgson]

11 hours ago, ruggedpeak said:

Used to be a lot of fatalities on the road next to Eilean Donan Castle near Kyle of Lochalsh as people would park on the side of a 60 mph single carriageway road and cross to see it. Eventually they had to build a proper car park which is what is there now. People on holiday put their brains into neutral and start taking risks that in 'normal' life they either wouldn't do or would do so with far more awareness. That has to be factored in. People go on holiday to take a break, and that often includes a break from keeping themselves safe.

 

As for WCRC, looks like history is repeating itself.

This morning I was a on a boat on Loch Ness.  No  safety problems I could see with that operation. 

However traffic on the road alongside the loch is fast, legally as national speed limit applies to most of it, and of course people are crossing the road at lay-bys, many of them overseas visitors who are not used to driving on the left.  I am told that head-on collisions are not unusual because of distracted drivers pulling out onto the wrong side

[11B]

So one question that relates to this, and at the risk of a public witch trial for asking...

 

What do NYMR for the doors on the Network Rail section they operate on to Whitby? Last time I travelled on it they didn't have CDL of a person at each door. Or to put it another way, could the impact of WCR's issues impact on NYMR!

 

Just a thought to chew over, please don't hate me.

 

Kind regards Ian 

[APOLLO]

23 hours ago, adb968008 said:

Love it!

 

Head south.. long way south, rumour has it theres a prototype 141 hiding in the jungle.

 

Are the 158’s still running in Bangkok ?

 

Yes as far as I know, I last saw one in 2019, my last visit (not my photo)

 

 

Found this photo on the web. If it's in the jungle the monkeys are welcome to it !!!!

 

 

Brit15

Edited July 26, 2023 by APOLLO

[woodenhead]

9 minutes ago, 11B said:

So one question that relates to this, and at the risk of a public witch trial for asking...

 

What do NYMR for the doors on the Network Rail section they operate on to Whitby? Last time I travelled on it they didn't have CDL of a person at each door. Or to put it another way, could the impact of WCR's issues impact on NYMR!

 

Just a thought to chew over, please don't hate me.

 

Kind regards Ian 

The current issue is specific to the Jacobite, other WCRC services are still able to run.

 

That would suggest that other solutions to the problem agreed with the ORR by other operators are ok unless or until the ORR deem them not to be.

[62613]

On 24/07/2023 at 18:48, DCB said:

Oh well it will keep the environmentalists happy if West Coast cease operations.

Actually it does prove the  whole thing is based on ignorance and a failure apply the lessons of the past.. There were some fatalities some years ago due to the doors on Mk1 sleepers being locked and passengers unable to escape and other instances when passengers have had difficulty escaping.   Central locking is beneficial in certain circumstances and dangerous in others.  Locking doors was made illegal at one stage due to problems escaping fires.   The Rail regulator may have a role but at some stage the dangers of competing scenarios have to evaluated and if doing nothing is the safer option as this case, then nothing is what should be done, except lobby for an enquiry into the usefulness or otherwise of the rail regulator.

Why does that all sound like John Chester Craven of the London and Brighton Railway arguing against the regulator's recommendations for "Lock and block" after the Clayton Tunnel accident in 1849(?)?

[Nick C]

53 minutes ago, 11B said:

So one question that relates to this, and at the risk of a public witch trial for asking...

 

What do NYMR for the doors on the Network Rail section they operate on to Whitby? Last time I travelled on it they didn't have CDL of a person at each door. Or to put it another way, could the impact of WCR's issues impact on NYMR!

 

Just a thought to chew over, please don't hate me.

 

Kind regards Ian 

I don't know about the NYMR, but the Swanage have fitted CDL to the DMU they use on the Wareham services.

[adb968008]

12 hours ago, phil-b259 said:

 

Although a good interim solution (and far better than mere 'garden gate' bolts), it still leaves the situation open to human error should the steward in charge of that door be distracted by passengers at the critical moment - plus if emergency escape was necessary then a T key operated lock could be problematic under certain circumstances.

 

Moreover a manual solution doesn't stop the train from moving - a centrally operated system can be interlocked with the brakes such that if a door is not detected as locked then the train cannot move.

 

A central locking system by contrast puts door releases in the hands of a single person (e.g. the train guard - who by and large will not be expected to be dealing with passengers), prevents the train from moving unless all doors are proved to be locked, while also being able to be released by passengers or emergency services by the use of sealed release (i.e. brake glass type boxes with an override switch) inside the carriage and recessed butterfly switches suitably mounted on the outside.

Agreed, though detraining a mk1 is safer and easier..

 

no need to locate hammers and break windows, just do what every other unfortunate in a mk1 accident has done… climb out the open window.

The chance of 1 human making an error is greater than a collective of 20. From what ive seen of onboard stewards, distracting them isnt easy and they are comfortable throwing their weight around, which is why i’m surprised this has become an issue up there.

 

Whatever the outcome CDL should be priority on the roadmap… automatic closing  train doors has been a standard on the continent since the 1960’s… almost as long as the mk1’s themselves. Its been a standard on cash strapped Amtrak since inception.

I dont know why BR never adopted this standard.

Edited July 26, 2023 by adb968008

[Boris]

1 hour ago, 11B said:

So one question that relates to this, and at the risk of a public witch trial for asking...

 

What do NYMR for the doors on the Network Rail section they operate on to Whitby? Last time I travelled on it they didn't have CDL of a person at each door. Or to put it another way, could the impact of WCR's issues impact on NYMR!

 

 

They made the decision to not exceed 25mph on the Esk Valley Line so they are exempt from requiring secondary door locking, they don't actually need to use the SDL bolts but they do anyway to deter the casual cretin.

[adb968008]

6 minutes ago, Boris said:

They made the decision to not exceed 25mph on the Esk Valley Line so they are exempt from requiring secondary door locking, they don't actually need to use the SDL bolts but they do anyway to deter the casual cretin.

How does speed impact a passenger opening a door ?

Even at 5mph, if you open a door and egress to a tunnel wall, or off a viaduct your outcome isnt good.

 

 

Edited July 26, 2023 by adb968008

[Boris]

21 minutes ago, adb968008 said:

How does speed impact a passenger opening a door ?

Even at 5mph, if you open a door and egress to a tunnel wall, or off a viaduct your outcome isnt good.

 

 

Ask the ORR it's their rule and goes back a long time.

 

However the current head of the ORR has indicated that he is much less inclined to give heritage operators derogations than his predecessor.  

Edited July 26, 2023 by Boris

[Reorte]

21 minutes ago, adb968008 said:

How does speed impact a passenger opening a door ?

Even at 5mph, if you open a door and egress to a tunnel wall, or off a viaduct your outcome isnt good.

Overall it's a lower risk than if the train is moving much faster.

 

Risk isn't absolute. The boundary between safe and dangerous is ultimately subjective, and there's no such thing as absolutely 100% safe, it's always a matter of where we decide the line should be drawn, at what point the risks become low enough that we're simply happy enough to accept them. To take an absolutely absurd extreme example no mitigation factors would be justified at all, no matter how easy, to deal with a risk where the outcome is a minor bruise and the odds of it happening are once in a billion years (if the odds of it happening to everyone were such that it was more likely than not every single hour then even that minor outcome should be mitigated against).

 

In this case the ORR are the ones who decide where the line should be drawn, hopefully consistently with society's overall perception of what level is and isn't acceptable.

Edited July 26, 2023 by Reorte

[ruggedpeak]

1 hour ago, Reorte said:

In this case the ORR are the ones who decide where the line should be drawn, hopefully consistently with society's overall perception of what level is and isn't acceptable.

Parts of British society believe if anyone gets hurt ever then those responsible should be hung, drawn and quartered regardless, unless they themselves were culpable in which cases it is all fine and we will write a report and 'lessons will be learnt' whilst carrying on as before.

 

I wonder what that ORR would make of this, Switzerland's last non-electrified line in full operation (but just used as a heritage and test route). Pedal powered train crossing an open viaduct over the Rhine. Health & safety meant that we, including a small child, had to stay on the 'train' and not walk on the bridge as it had been raining and might be slippery. Suspect the ORR would have a meltdown. What you can't see in the photos is the walkway is only to the sides, between the sleepers is just a gap......drop anything and it is a long drop into the Rhine.

 

That said, I think the crux of the WCRC issue is that there are defined safety processes and they are not being followed. Whether they are needed, appropriate etc is a separate issue. Not following defined proceudres without a properly justificable reason is the easiest way of falling foul of health & safety (after not having any procedures at all!).

Edited July 26, 2023 by ruggedpeak

[The Stationmaster]

17 hours ago, adb968008 said:

Why not use a T key to lock the doors and have the steward manage them ?

its a 25-30mph trundle on a sparsely used line afterall.

A Southall style accident is very unlikely.

One simple reason - in the event of a major incident you will be left with a train with all passenger doors locked and potentially those with the. keys might not be in a fit condition to get to the doors   The existing bolts can be opened by anyone in such a situation and in any case there would (should) be a steward available for every pair of doors and all of them are unlikely to be incapitated (one hopes).

 

2 hours ago, Reorte said:

Overall it's a lower risk than if the train is moving much faster.

 

Risk isn't absolute. The boundary between safe and dangerous is ultimately subjective, and there's no such thing as absolutely 100% safe, it's always a matter of where we decide the line should be drawn, at what point the risks become low enough that we're simply happy enough to accept them. To take an absolutely absurd extreme example no mitigation factors would be justified at all, no matter how easy, to deal with a risk where the outcome is a minor bruise and the odds of it happening are once in a billion years (if the odds of it happening to everyone were such that it was more likely than not every single hour then even that minor outcome should be mitigated against).

 

In this case the ORR are the ones who decide where the line should be drawn, hopefully consistently with society's overall perception of what level is and isn't acceptable.

It depends very much on the risk assessment which will have considered the situation in respect of that train and related factors - as I explained above.   There was a procedure in place to mitigate potential risks and it was not being followed - it's as simple as that.

WCRC do have something of a history when it comes to either not having procedures in place (hopefully now fully dealt with) or - possibly worse - not following  procedures which do exist.  Not all of the latter - such as the train starting away from Reading before the Driver had got the Ready To Start signal - have made major headline.

[Reorte]

33 minutes ago, ruggedpeak said:

Parts of British society believe if anyone gets hurt ever then those responsible should be hung, drawn and quartered regardless, unless they themselves were culpable in which cases it is all fine and we will write a report and 'lessons will be learnt' whilst carrying on as before.

Parts of society, maybe, but not necessarily society overall. Society overall has its values and principles. Rules and laws (should) reflect rather than define this; if they don't and you've got a noticeable discrepancy between laws and society's attitudes then the law should change, and indeed it frequently has over time, largely thanks to this country being a democracy and thus social values have a direct influence. I don't want to delve much further in to that in order to keep clear of the "no politics" rule though.

[Reorte]

8 minutes ago, The Stationmaster said:

It depends very much on the risk assessment which will have considered the situation in respect of that train and related factors - as I explained above.   There was a procedure in place to mitigate potential risks and it was not being followed - it's as simple as that.

WCRC do have something of a history when it comes to either not having procedures in place (hopefully now fully dealt with) or - possibly worse - not following  procedures which do exist.  Not all of the latter - such as the train starting away from Reading before the Driver had got the Ready To Start signal - have made major headline.

I was speaking pretty generally, in response to a post that wasn't being specific about this incident. Note that I said "In this case the ORR are the ones who decide where the line should be drawn, hopefully consistently with society's overall perception of what level is and isn't acceptable," and it seems WCRC are crossing that line - I'm not disputing that. Maybe that line doesn't lie with exactly where I'd draw it (some uncertainty there of course because I'm not an expert, so the reasonable thing is to leave it to those who are - it's only if anyone says "so shut up" that a line is crossed there) but, relating to my post above this one, part of a healthy society is accepting that that will sometimes be the case and going along with it.

 

Also re: my earlier post where I'm wary of any company that doesn't appear to make a decent effort to follow the rules whatever I may think of them in a particular instance, since it's suggestive of an overall cavalier attitude.

Edited July 26, 2023 by Reorte