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Glasgow train accidents

PostPosted: Sun Feb 25, 2007 6:43 pm
by Simba
Reading a timeline on the BBC just now which lists fatal accidents in the past 60 years. I remember reading about the train disaster at St Enoch's in another thread (possibly the one about the station itself) but I wasn't aware of most of the ones mentioned on the timeline. With so many people interested in the railways here I thought it might be an interesting topic? Some of the ones listed below aren't in Glasgow itself, but nearby.

August 1973: Five were killed and 50 hurt when an electric train hit a diesel train near Glasgow Central Station.

April 1979: A collision between two trains near Paisley left seven people dead and 67 hurt.

October 1979: Five people died and 52 were hurt when two passenger trains collided at Invergowrie.

July 1984: Thirteen people were killed and 44 hurt in a derailment in Falkirk.

6 March 1989: Two suburban electric trains in Glasgow collided head-on on a single track and two people died.

21 July 1991: Four people died and 22 were hurt as two trains collided head on at Newton station, near Glasgow.

June 1994: Two people died after a train travelling from Wemyss Bay to Glasgow derailed when vandals put concrete blocks on the tracks near Drumfrochar railway station.

PostPosted: Sun Feb 25, 2007 6:59 pm
by tobester
There was also a collision between PartickHill and Hyndland involving 2 class 314s, i was off school ill and heard the ambulance as the surgery used to be on dumbarton road at the time,was1980, i think the collision was roughly where sainsbury's is now.

This is it here

Re: Glasgow train accidents

PostPosted: Sun Feb 25, 2007 7:06 pm
by Smartalex
Simba wrote:6 March 1989: Two suburban electric trains in Glasgow
collided head-on on a single track and two people died.


This Accident was on the Helensburgh-Springburn line near my house just after Bellgrove Station, There is a Wikipedia Entry >Here<

PostPosted: Sun Feb 25, 2007 7:27 pm
by richardlord
Did a train not once plough right through Queen St station?

Seem to remember my maw telling me about it when I was a lad?

Might just be talking pish right enough...

Re: Glasgow train accidents

PostPosted: Sun Feb 25, 2007 7:43 pm
by james73
Smartalex wrote:
Simba wrote:6 March 1989: Two suburban electric trains in Glasgow
collided head-on on a single track and two people died.


This Accident was on the Helensburgh-Springburn line near my house just after Bellgrove Station, There is a Wikipedia Entry >Here<

The Bellgrove junction crash. I was on a Springburn-bound train an hour
before that happened the very same day. :o



James H

PostPosted: Sun Feb 25, 2007 8:45 pm
by glasgowken
From my very limited selection of railway books,

1845, May 19th, a Glasgow wine merchant hired a train to take him to Edinburgh. At Gogar it was run into by the following express from Glasgow. The merchant was killed.

1850, August 1st, a train heading for an agricultural show in Glasgow, was rammed by another at Cowlairs. 5 died.

1911, a train from Edinburgh traveling too fast, jumped the buffers at Queen Street, and crashed into the wall of the station bar. Luckily there were no deaths.

1928, October 12th, a train heading for Edinburgh was hit by another just inside the Cowlairs tunnel, 2 deaths, and 20 in hospital. One of the dead was a groom on his wedding day, his bride lost a leg.

There must have been a few more incidents.

PostPosted: Sun Feb 25, 2007 8:57 pm
by The_Clincher
richardlord wrote:Did a train not once plough right through Queen St station?

Seem to remember my maw telling me about it when I was a lad?

Might just be talking pish right enough...


I remember being told of that one too....James 73/Alcyidon any info? :?:

PostPosted: Sun Feb 25, 2007 8:59 pm
by MadMac
I recommend the excellent "Railways Archive" site for accident reports on those mentioned and many other incidents:

http://www.railwaysarchive.co.uk/index.php?PHPSESSID=b26e20ba0144498a57a7bfb8ba6a4ba5

PostPosted: Sun Feb 25, 2007 11:03 pm
by MacotheIsles
Simba - good topic!

I remember most of those recent accidents (1973 onwards). I just missed being in the front coach of the Newton crash train and I met a BT police sergeant who had carried a child's body from the 1979 Paisley wreck. The Invergowrie crash was due to a communication error - 'Lunan Bay' was confused with 'Letham Grange', or vice versa.

There've been a few near-misses: the explosives train that derailed in Barncluith Tunnel near Hamilton (1976?), severing the overhead line and potentially causing a catastrophic blast, for one.

My grandfather was working on the Caley at the time of Quintenshill (1915) - the worst British railway disaster of them all.

PostPosted: Sun Feb 25, 2007 11:56 pm
by gap74
I lived a few hundred yards from the Newton crash site - still do, indeed.

I'm sure I still have a pile of newspapers from the time, I'll scan some in if I find them and get a chance.

PostPosted: Mon Feb 26, 2007 12:02 am
by MadMac
MacotheIsles wrote:The Invergowrie crash was due to a communication error - 'Lunan Bay' was confused with 'Letham Grange', or vice versa.


Different incident. Invergowrie was a signal passed at Danger, then the train ran into the back of a failed one. Lunan Bay was several years earlier. Reports for both on "Railways Archive" (see above for link).

PostPosted: Mon Feb 26, 2007 1:08 am
by McShad
Am I the only one a bit uneasy about discussions on train crashes? Fridays event was tragic but the media are going totally overboard as usual. Implied speculations everywhere.... which forced network rail to check 700 points just to keep 'everyone' happy. Good old BBC have stated there is a demand for a public enquiry.... from who exactly? Isnt an investigation into the cause enough? Won't that teach any lessons that need to be learned? I'm just a bit fed up with the medias style of reporting these days. Just give us the facts and show us the pictures/footage... job be done.

PostPosted: Mon Feb 26, 2007 7:57 am
by Alycidon
MadMac wrote:I recommend the excellent "Railways Archive" site for accident reports on those mentioned and many other incidents


Second that MadMac, this is the place to go for accident information. I attended (as a spectator) the Public Inquiry in the Bruce Hotel to the Collision that occurred on 11th June 1974 at Pollokshields. It was very interesting to see the witnesses being questioned, the driver was a fault on that occasion and I vividly remember him being interrogated about the sequence of events. Poor sod was in tears at the end.

The class 303s seen to have been accident prone, I have a list of accidents they were involved in http://www.jhowie.force9.co.uk/303tributepage4.htm

Some units involved: 1) Bellgrove
Image

2) Hyndland (being rebuilt)
Image

I totally agree with the comments made by McShad, the media hysteria has been unbelievable. 3,201 people were killed on Britain's roads in 2005, (the last statistics currently available), not a single fatality on the railways in 2005 (or 2006 for that matter). I agree one fatality is one too many, but if you read the press you would think that the railways are suddenly death traps just wailting for the next big pile up. The ignorance of journalists has also been evident, why don't these idiots try doing some research before they open their mouths. The one that got me was the mobile phone photograph showing the "panic" immediately after the derailment, oh yeh, if I was in a panoc and thought my life was in danger the last thing I would be doing is grabbing my mobile to take a few snaps, obviously thinking "here is a way to make a quick buck"

Rant over for now........

PostPosted: Mon Feb 26, 2007 8:16 am
by dave2
The mobile pics were mainly from a BBC staff member on the train, who also phoned her newsdesk to give them info on the situation.

PostPosted: Mon Feb 26, 2007 8:39 am
by brickwall
How does the U.K. compare? My German colleague says on the whole we're not too bad for a large country (leaving aside some Railtrack blunders). A quick search of Wiki seems to confirm this, at least partially.

Rail buffs step forward.