Long delay on the 11:00 Penzance to Paddington - 04 Aug 13

[whole diary]

[bobm]

According to Realtraintimes today's 11:00 from Penzance to London Paddington arrived in London nearly SIX hours late.

That's a mighty big delay. It seems the train came to grief after leaving Westbury and it obviously took a while to get things sorted.

[LiskeardRich]

Just got a mention on pirate fm radio 11pm news. (uses a national news source at this bulletin). Passenger interviewed was heavily critical of the way the incident was handled by staff. The report gave it as break failure just outside Pewsey.

[JayMac]

From the BBC^» (British Broadcasting Corporation - home page):

First Great Western passengers stranded on train for five hours

Hundreds of passengers were stranded on a broken-down train for more than five hours after a fractured air pipe caused its brakes to lock.

First Great Western said there were just under 500 people on the train from Penzance to London Paddington when it stalled near Pewsey, Wiltshire.

It was at a standstill for about five and a half hours, arriving at Paddington at about 22:30 BST.

The company said refreshments were provided.

A number of people on board the train vented their frustration on Twitter.

One customer named Sarah tweeted that passengers had been "treated like cattle", adding: "No food, no water, no air con, no toilets flushing!

"Management on trains not communicating with passengers at all."

[Timmer]

"Management on trains not communicating with passengers at all."

Once again, reports of a lack of communication when things go wrong. Not good.

[John R]

Where is the plan that says, once a train has been delayed for X mins (60 or 90?) an incident is declared, and a team of senior people are deployed, regardless of day or time, to manage the situation. 

[Henry]

 I agree that should be the case, although I think you will find
 most FGW^▸ (First Great Western) senior 'Managers' do not work week-ends.

[Worcester_Passenger]

"Management on trains not communicating with passengers at all."

Once again, reports of a lack of communication when things go wrong. Not good.

I seem to remember looking at JourneyCheck some time yesterday afternoon. A later train was shown as being diverted via Swindon on account of "a broken-down train", but there was no mention of the broken-down one itself.

Meanwhile, this morning the first train out of Hereford has died at Shrub Hill, but, as of 07:33, the reason for this is still "a matter under investigation". Clearly a difficult problem.

[Pb_devon]

BBC^» (British Broadcasting Corporation - home page) South West interviewed PAX off the delayed service who were very critical.  No FGW^▸ (First Great Western) response in the piece I saw this morning.

[eightf48544]

Mark Hopwood on Today (monday) apologising.

Unfortuantely incidents like these are going to become more common so long a we run a shoestring railway particularly at weekend.

Once it became apparent that it was  as sever mechanical breakdown (split brake piep which would require a replacement part then steps should have bee taken to evacuate the train and load the passengers onto a another service. Either an Empty HST^▸ (High Speed Train) bought back wrong line or on the Down.

For safety reasons the replacemnt train should have been bought to a complete stand and protected with detenators. Then the transfer could take palce.

Unfortunately my plan falls down on several counts Networkrail would consider it unsafe to empty a train onto a mainline, secondly FGW^▸ (First Great Western) probably wouldn't have had a spare driver or guard to man the empty train  even if they could find a spare servicable HST set.

Interesting there are no FGW Thunderbird locos unlike Virgin. I think with an increasing number of HST, which aren't getting any younger,  brake failures FGW will have to consider employing Thunderbirds

[trainer]

Also on BBC^» (British Broadcasting Corporation - home page) News Channel, but they're only featuring angry pax, so more bad publicity to be repeated through the day until something 'more important' happens. Perhaps something to do with cricket will push it out of the agenda.

[Gordon the Blue Engine]

This item was on the BBC^» (British Broadcasting Corporation - home page) Radio 4 News at 2200 last night, and again on this morning's News bulletins.  Also the Today programme carried interviews with irate passengers coming off the train at Padd at 2200 last night .

Broken air pipes are nothing new on HSTs^▸ (High Speed Train), whether they be between the coaches or inside the power car. There are ways of dealing with failures like this, whether operationally (splitting/towing train away) or technically (repairs to broken item).   Westbury - Pewsey is hardly in the middle of nowhere. 

FGW^▸ (First Great Western)'s handling of this was completely unacceptable.  Excuses that it was the weekend, no money, no spare resources, no senior managers (although I'm not sure what use they would be except to authorise additional expenditure) etc., simply don't wash.

[stuving]

FGW^▸ (First Great Western)'s handling of this was completely unacceptable.  Excuses that it was the weekend, no money, no spare resources, no senior managers (although I'm not sure what use they would be except to authorise additional expenditure) etc., simply don't wash.

I'd expect there to be strict rules about who can authorise expensive interventions or trade off major disruptions to other services, and would not object. However, to run a railway that authority needs to be delegated to someone on duty, or else someone has to be on call (by phone should be adequate). Otherwise a decision has been made that Sunday passengers don't count - though that might be an unconscious decision. I've never worked anywhere that's customer facing or providing real-time services, but there has always such a system for taking urgent decisions. So as an excuse that does not work.

[ChrisB]

FGW^▸ (First Great Western) do have a senior manager call-out roster.

The train was 30 minutes across fields from the nearest road, so it was considered that detraining 500+ pax & asking them to traipse that far with their luggage was unacceptable. I agree.

There's a longer piece with more detail on the Guardian website
http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2013/aug/05/first-great-western-train-delay

Lack of a rescue loco and on-train comms seem to be the real problems for me. Whether you could easily store & carry sufficient water for a this sort of problem (where delay exceeds say 90+ mins) needs exploring. The number of times it happens can be counted on one hand over the last couple of years (or longer?)

[Southern Stag]

Interesting there are no FGW^▸ (First Great Western) Thunderbird locos unlike Virgin. I think with an increasing number of HST^▸ (High Speed Train), which aren't getting any younger,  brake failures FGW will have to consider employing Thunderbirds

The train was attended to by a rescue loco, but it took a while to get there. A Class 59 ran up from Westbury, the rear power car was detached and the 59 hauled it back to Westbury. The front power car then continued with the train alone to Paddington. The other power car was then recovered today by a Class 57 and hauled to Laira. The delay in the 59 running to the train was probably because the first action taken by FGW is to attempt to rectify the fault, rather than dragging the train straight away.

[LiskeardRich]

FGW^▸ (First Great Western) do have a senior manager call-out roster.

The train was 30 minutes across fields from the nearest road, so it was considered that detraining 500+ pax & asking them to traipse that far with their luggage was unacceptable. I agree.

There's a longer piece with more detail on the Guardian website
http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2013/aug/05/first-great-western-train-delay

Lack of a rescue loco and on-train comms seem to be the real problems for me. Whether you could easily store & carry sufficient water for a this sort of problem (where delay exceeds say 90+ mins) needs exploring. The number of times it happens can be counted on one hand over the last couple of years (or longer?)

the incident happened at the 73^ milepost between Pewsey and Savernake. A look on Google earth suggests the nearest road much close, and the River Avon also being very nearby, perhaps send in a boat?