Royal mail train almost robbed

[Craig1989]

On Tuesday apparently a couple of teens tried to rob a royal mail train on its way to Scotland. How is this possible this day and age? 
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12360773/amp/Two-teenagers-tried-rob-Royal-Mail-train-Scotland.html

 

cheers Craig 

[br2975]

2 minutes ago, Craig1989 said:

 How is this possible this day and age? 

.

It doesn't appear to be possible; that's probably why they failed.

.

 

Edited August 2, 2023 by br2975

[darrel]

I'm surprised at their age. When I heard about it at first I thought there most have been someone with some inside knowledge. I've heard a bit more than what is in the public domain which I won't go into but there must have been pre planning that went into this. Despite their age they knew what they were doing. It think it's been inspired by the original robbery in the 60s but time will tell it will all come out in the wash. 

[St. Simon]

2 hours ago, Craig1989 said:

On Tuesday apparently a couple of teens tried to rob a royal mail train on its way to Scotland. How is this possible this day and age? 
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12360773/amp/Two-teenagers-tried-rob-Royal-Mail-train-Scotland.html

 

cheers Craig 

Hi,

 

I just read the initial basic report in the daily log, and it smacks of insider information, albeit likely indirectly, they knew what they were doing and where they were doing it!

I’ve always thought about doing a thought experiment with our graduates and apprentices about how you might pull something like this off with a modern signalling systems (as purely an education in the system rather than creating light figured Fred’s!)

 

Simon

Edited August 2, 2023 by St. Simon

[Wickham Green too]

Not very clever copycats if they were still at the scene when the rozzers turned up !

[russ p]

I think they have watched buster too many times!

[Oldddudders]

Lockerbie really isn't a lucky place, is it? PanAm 103 was off-any-scale hideous, of course, while this is merely silly by comparison, but all the same, not what you want your community to be famous for. 

[Mike_Walker]

What amazed me was that plod turned up so quickly!

[Reorte]

1 hour ago, Oldddudders said:

Lockerbie really isn't a lucky place, is it? PanAm 103 was off-any-scale hideous, of course, while this is merely silly by comparison, but all the same, not what you want your community to be famous for. 

Not really all that far from Quintinshill either.

 

13 hours ago, St. Simon said:

I’ve always thought about doing a thought experiment with our graduates and apprentices about how you might pull something like this off with a modern signalling systems (as purely an education in the system rather than creating light figured Fred’s!)

What would happen if you waited to dark and just covered over the signal heads and put a red light in? Obviously it would contradict with all sorts of other indications, e.g. preceding signals (unless they're covered up and faked too) and AWS, but a driver seeing a red light where he expects a signal?

[Wickham Green too]

Just the absence of any signal light should be taken as a Danger indication.

[The Stationmaster]

Faking signal aspects wouldn't be too difficult at a remote location but you'd really need to get the colours and light intensity right.  Provided you could do that it's probably the easiest bit. Knowing which train to have a profitable go at obviously needs inside information; or were they just a pair of chancers?

 

Having a go at a train conveying mails - unless things have changed drastically - is probably one of the quickest routes available to getting your collar felt with a consequent  appearance in front of the person wearing a white wig.   

[Reorte]

1 minute ago, The Stationmaster said:

Faking signal aspects wouldn't be too difficult at a remote location but you'd really need to get the colours and light intensity right.

 

Even if you get the colours and intensity wrong presumably the driver should be saying "something's wrong with those signals, so stop." Same really as the above-mentioned absence of light, although I suppose a poor fake is going to put the driver on alert and the radio?

[ruggedpeak]

Not very bright criminals. They should have learnt from the Hatton Garden diamond heist, 'old skool' well-planned robberies and heists are technically possible to pull off but now very difficult to get away with for various reasons.

 

And when you start buggering around with things that might be perceived in any way as a possible act of terrorism the level of response tends to be a bit more robust. A report of a train under some form of attack is likely to trigger a much greater response than a ram raid on the cash machine at the local newsagents.

[Reorte]

Incidentally don't take my above musings as any indication that I had anything to do with this or am planning anything myself! I've not been thinking about this beforehand!

Edited August 3, 2023 by Reorte

[Oldddudders]

1 minute ago, Reorte said:

Incidentally don't take my above musings as any indication that I had anything to do with this or am planning anything myself! I've not been thinking about this beforehand!

Miss Marilyn Rice-Davies's evidence from 60 years ago comes to mind. "Well, you would say that, wouldn't you?"

[ruggedpeak]

3 minutes ago, Reorte said:

Incidentally don't take my above musings as any indication that I had anything to do with this or am planning anything myself! I've not been thinking about this beforehand!

Obviously 😉

 

[The Stationmaster]

4 minutes ago, Oldddudders said:

Miss Marilyn Rice-Davies's evidence from 60 years ago comes to mind. "Well, you would say that, wouldn't you?"

Mandy Rice Davies - maybe you were thinking of her physical atrinbutes?

[Oldddudders]

1 minute ago, The Stationmaster said:

Mandy Rice Davies - maybe you were thinking of her physical atrinbutes?

Yes, the media dubbed her Handy Mandy, but baptismally - as per court hearings - Marilyn. 

[SZ]

20 hours ago, Craig1989 said:

On Tuesday apparently a couple of teens tried to rob a royal mail train on its way to Scotland. How is this possible this day and age? 
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12360773/amp/Two-teenagers-tried-rob-Royal-Mail-train-Scotland.html

 

cheers Craig 

 

Isn't it fairly trivial to occupy a track circuit?

[Wickham Green too]

I'm not sure 'trivial' was the word you were looking for ??!?

[Titan]

Possibly, but with the spread of axle counters it gets a lot more difficult to trick a section in to "occupied"

[The Stationmaster]

1 hour ago, SZ said:

 

Isn't it fairly trivial to occupy a track circuit?

That of course assumes that there is a track circuit and that nobody will notice if it actually drops should teh attempt work

[beast66606]

The location was Kirtlebridge.

 

Signal GMC847 had the aspect removed / smashed, the signals preceeding it showed the correct aspects (presumably G/YY/Y -> red which became blank), the driver of the mail, 1S55, stopped to report the blank aspect and noticed 2 males on the signal, as he reported it they then tried to rob the train. Police attended and 2 were arrested.

Later it was noticed that the aspect had also been removed / smashed from GMC848 signal.

 

This has been widely discussed on various forums, I've redacted some details for brevity but it's no secret.

 

[Michael Hodgson]

I would imagine the emergency transmission capabilities of the stricken traincrew would be more effective these days than what was available more than half a century ago, and that a detailed location could be given rapidly to the old bill.

[Michael Hodgson]

Timing would be key when planning such an attack so as not to stop the wrong train - would they have been able to identify their target using publicly available info like Realtime Trains?