Great Western Coffee Shop

Sad to report another fataility, this time at Iver:

Services between London Paddington and Reading are being disrupted due to a person being hit by a train at Iver.
Two out of four lines have now been re-opened to allow some services to operate. Delays, cancelations, and alterations will continue for some time.

Very sad.

Looks like 1545 Pad- Swansea involved.

Lots and lots of delays.

Delays and cancellations still ongoing - from the FGW website (http://www.firstgreatwestern.co.uk/LiveUpdateList.aspx):

...and yet again I was on duty in Control. As with Ealing last week, this was a very dramatic fatality with a lot of counselling now needed for colleagues involved. Because this was the start of the evening rush, the knock on effect was much more dramatic, with over 100 services effected. As before, thoughts must be with the FGW driver and those who witnessed the events.

Ironically, whilst being travelling during the affected period, it didnt actually effect me.

I headed for the 1821 RDG to WOS and ended up on the 1750 to HFD which pathed along the 1821 path and got into WOS about the same time (if not earlier) than the 1821 would have.

First time a jumper has ever done me a favour - as far as i'm concerned at least he/she did something useful for at least one person with their last act!  I have every sympathy for the drivers and those clearing up the mess but really, I have no sympathy for the deceased.  As I've said before, sequester any estate and donate it to charity if not the body who will have to pay compensation for the delays.  May deter people from this if they know their loved ones (who they usually think they are doing a favour for) will suffer more.  

You didn't have anything to do with an HST on the halts service from Oxford then! Bet the regulars enjoyed that.

It was the HST or nothing!!! We had already lost the path for 1W47 which terminated at Oxford, but we needed the seats to go through to Worcester, so 2E95/2E96 became an HST complete with catering. Maximum use of the SDO at Combe, Finstock etc

IWhat was the 1717 from Reading that was terminated at Didcot but which should have gone to Oxford - or at least thats what we at Reading were told. 

I was praying they didnt tell the people on the train so my 1750 delayed for 40 minutes was not a sardine can

A welcome benefit of SDO. No doubt accompanied by baffled looks on the faces of those people used to hammering past flat out, who had no idea of the existence of the likes of Combe, Finstock or Ascott.

The 17.21 was surprisingly quiet when I got on at Oxford - where it handily turned up around the time the 17.51 was due - had a pair of sets in coach A to myself all the way home, despite it picking up two trains' worth of passengers.

I can't obviously see incidents posted anywhere else...so will post about it here..

Train services out of Paddington were badly disrupted tonight due to an incident at iver...

I decided not to rush to Paddington as I knew what it would be like.. So I arrived there about 19.25..

When I got there the next trains out were the 19.22, 19.27 and 19.42 departures and were all showing as delayed.. The boards were also saying there were delays due to this "incident" and that they hoped to start running trains again about 18.30.. So that was at least an hour out of date then... ???

There was an announcement made but we couldn't really hear it...

Finally the 19.27 was announced for platform 13.. As you can imagine that created a bit of a stampede.. Some poor man managed to trip over one of the mats that I think is there to soak up leaking rain water (well I assume so anyway).. Several other passengers helped to pick him up so I didn't need to..

Anyway.. on platform 12 there was a train (a FGW rather than the usual Heathrow connect in this platform).. There were some people on it as the doors were open.. I did ask one person already on the train if they knew where that train was going but they didn't.. So I carried on to platform 13.. Except, as you might guess.. the train there was already full...

I asked the train despatcher if he happened to know where the train at platform 12 was going to but before he could answer he had to rush off to stop anyone else getting on the train on 13 so it could leave.. He did then tell people there would be another train in 5 minutes but also completely forgot to come back and answer my question..

I decided to head back to the main concourse.. On the information board on the way back I noticed the 19.18 departure had appeared on the board and was at platform 11.. even though it hadn't been on the board previously.. This train is first stop Maidenhead.. Walking back down platform 12 there were various drops of blood which I can only assume came from the poor man who fell over rushing to platform 13.. There were also people still on thetrain on platform 12  (in fact they might still be there now  ::)).. I got on the 19.18.. It was half empty as most people were still either on platform 13 waiting or somewhere in between I think..

So although my journey wasn't too bad in the end.. the communication and organisation was totally rubbish.. Not that I'm surprised to be honest.. But someone somewhere managed to make a bad situation much much worse..

Will they ever learn? I'm sure (for example) the 19.18 didn't suddenly miraculously appear in platform 11 to the surprise of everyone..someone surely had to drive it there? Well at least I hope so..I also wonder why the platform 12 train had open doors as that just invites people to get on.. As to my opinion of making people rush to platform 13/14... hhmmm....

I did tell Ollie about the incident with the passenger who got hurt on platform 12 as I was pretty sure that it wasn't reported to a member of staff at the time and apart from anything else someone eventually would have wondered where the blood came from.. Thanks Ollie  ;D

I disagree that people are forced to rush to platform 13/14 - in reality what is likely is that people saw it was the 19:27 departure and figured they had to rush for it.

In regard to the incident on Platform 12 - I did call up Paddington control room - as I told you, and they hadn't been made aware, so I can only assume the gent is well, as if an ambulance required Network Rail would have been informed.

Information is still poor at times, and this is unfortunately because it can still be pretty sketchy on what's occuring and which train will do what. Hence trains being cancelled then actually being run. I suspect this may be what happened to your 19:18, but I couldn't possibly say for sure.

Screens showing out of date information is obviously not good - and no doubt lessons will be learnt from todays mess.

Notwork Rail are cr*p when it comes to disruption. They cant keep the boards up to date, they cant distribute information on the radios.
There was an internal brief which explained who is supposed to do what during disruption. I see that fell apart today.

The only information us platform staff got was from our own managers who directly called up swindon. That is supposed to come from Notwork Rail PAD control.

Some trains actually left without being advertised because of how full they were before the announcement to hold all trains at PAD was made. Notwork Rail were trying to order us to allow us to advertise them, despite the warning that the trains were already overcrowded.

Several trains went out completely full and standing both in standard and first class. There was also a train problem (which I cant go into for obvious reasons) that caused further delays.

No reservations didn't help matters either, but you have a choice to make. Do we delay the trains further and reserve the seats or do we try and get them boarded and out as quickly as possible.

It also doesn't help when your trying to tell passengers that you have no information and then they start throwing abuse at you. Nor does it help when you get passengers shouting that because they pay ^x a year for first class ticket and they "want seat G 06 F come hell or high water" and "why the hell is that lot in there".

The bicycle passengers were also the usual abusive selves again. 6 means 6 not 7/8/9.


To quote a manager "This is the worse ive seen it in 2 years".

Well yes I would agree usually.. But today it was proven.. As soon as the platform was advertised we all set off.. And a lot of us didn't get on the train...I think people know that when there are very few trains it's best to get there as soon as possible if you need to be somewhere for a reason.. Maybe the man who fell over had a very good reason to be on that train (although I'm pretty sure he didn't make it on to it)..

And oh dear.. that is not acceptable either from passengers...not in the slightest..

I was on the 16:27 which got capped at Hayes, the driver did give the reason why but could not help with any further information.

Quite a few passengers want to go on to Slough, Maidenhead, Reading but there is no bus service from Hayes to Slough you have to go the Heathrow!   The woman who runs the taxi office at Hayes went off to try and get some on the night drivers to come in early, no sign what so ever of any FGW staff at Hayes, PA system does not work at the booking hall level or the duty station staff just gave up ???

After only a short wait a group of 6 of us got into a taxi to Maidenhead, the driver wanted ^15 each which was talked down to ^10 each

These incidents are difficult to deal with neither NR or the TOC's know when the Police will release the scene cack to NR, I have looked at the performance stats for yesterday unusually the fatality (suicide) is down as a TOC incident and not NR

I got to PAD at around my usual time of 16:50 to catch the 17:06 to Westbury (for Twyford) when I discovered the disruption which it appeared had only just started as the first train still on the departure screens was the 16:42 stopper to Reading. By 17:00 it was clear that this was going to be yet another long delay, on my past experiences of this sort of thing I was guessing it could be 2 hours before anything was running - and then the first trains would be utterly overcrowded.

Not fancying a long wait either at or near PAD, and not fancying also a schlep via Waterloo and Reading on SWT (which was the advice from the public address), I decided 'what the hell' and forked out 18 quid for the HEX. (There were many announcements on the train to advise FGW ticket holders that their tickets wouldn't be valid.) At Airport Jct we passed a stationary HST which from the window labels appeared to be the 16:30 to Taunton via Bristol TM.

On arrival at Terminal 5 I rushed to the bus station where with sheer good luck a First Bus route 77 to Slough was just about to leave. Although there was heavy traffic in Langley I made it to Slough station at about 18:05 in the hope that trains from Reading were being turned back there. So far so good.

However the new CIS screens at Slough were in 'chocolate teapot' mode. They simply showed a list of scheduled departures from about 16:30 onwards as either 'cancelled' or 'on time'. At about 18:15 an HST arrived on Platform 2 which appeared to be the 16:22 PAD-Oxford. At the same time it was announced that a Turbo arriving in Platform 5 would continue to London which it did although it departed slowly with a yellow signal.

Finally at about 18:30 a Turbo for Reading arrived in Platform 4. It was busy but not overcrowded so I guess it had been stuck somewhere. After leaving Slough we were overtaken by that Taunton HST and then by another HST after Maidenhead. Arrival at Twyford was at 18:53.

So I'm over 20 quid out of pocket :-[ but I think I probably had an easier journey than a lot of people (and it was quite interesting and different!).

Yes I forgot to say that when I got back to Maidenhead the "old" information screens (I don't think we're ever going to get the new ones) were stuck mid afternoon.. Mind you the last two mornings at 9am they've been stuck round about 6am which creates a fair amount of confusion each time a train arrives.. :)

It's the same at Twyford although this morning they'd made it another 30 minutes to 6.30am before getting stuck! (My 18:53 arrival last night was shown on the platform indicator as the 15:42 'on time' departure to Reading...)

Disruption is when the stupid way we've decided to run the railway by separating the wheel from the track makes itself know.

Instead of Western Region in total control, you have Paddington FGW speaking to Swindon FGW who then tell Notworkrail control who then tell Paddington Notworkrail and Slough IECC   which trains it wants to run where and when but probably doesn't give Paddington FGW the information. Notworkrail then decides which buttons it's going to press.

BR WR could muck up quite well on these occasions but at least the General Manager after staggering out of BRB mornign conference at Marylebone with arrows in his back could shoot a couple of people to encourage the others.

Having been shot one morning for not running a fast Brighton on the Main Line from Gloucester Road you don't do it again.

AIUI The driver thought he hit someone but after an extensive search nothing was found.

Arrived at pad at 17:15- saw the chaos and bailed to Waterloo. Luckily I know my way round there and boarded a Reading train before it got announced and got a seat. Was completely rammed full on departure, pax at Clapham J didn't stand a chance. Arrived Maidenhead at 20:15

In the cicumstances isn't there something in the rules about cautioning trains through the section to report any obstructions etc.

It went something like "Proceed with caution being prepared to stop short of any obstruction". Which meant something like 10 mph but you got the section surveyed and if nothing found the service starts running again.

Hi,

I got caught up I this yesterday.  I arrived just before 7pm to see that no fast trains were leaving so waited around before rushing to catch a train on platform 5 only for everyone to be told that due to their being no driver it wouldn't be leaving until he'd had his compulsory break so it was suggested everyone going as far as Didcot crossed over to the next platform (4) to board the 19.45 train.  Unfortunately so did lots of people who'd been sat on the train on platform 1 for 45mins so as well as people who intended catching the 19.45 there was also at least two other trains worth of people who tried to get on it.  Unfortunately during the 20 mins wait to leave two other HSTs left - so bad choice/guess by me who wanted to get to Reading!

I can't recall ever being so crushed in my life on a train!  I was squeezed at the front in carriage H against the door.  At some point on the journey the TM's office door in the vestibule gave way to give us some bonus space!!!  ;D  People joked and got through it though and the TM on the journey helped explain the situation well I thought.  Some people got out at Maidenhead (first stop) and then a whole load at Reading.

I felt sorry for the staff having to deal with such confusion.  One thing I will say is that under such circumstances (i.e. crushed conditions on delayed trains) seat reservations should just be binned as applying them simply doesn't work as people can't get to their seats anyway.  I'm sure staff have better things to do with their time than place all the reservation slips at such confused times anyway!

Boppy.

I agree that there is no need for passengers to be abusive. However, the point is we all pay good money to travel and it amazes me how un customer focused the train industry is. I quite agree that the way the railways are set up doesn^t help. But the point is that information break downs happen far too often, no one seems to be willing to help passengers home by other means  costs too much) and as far as most passengers are concerned they don^t care which company is to blame they want to get home.
   At the risk of upsetting people, as far as I^m concerned The ticket machine/ web site says FGW, all the signage on the station says FGW, the staff uniform says FGW and the train says FGW so frankly the buck stops with FGW.  I^ve said before that I^ve found some staff to be of little use and rude in these situations- no matter how polite I am and If I was to come out with some of the things I^ve heard said where I work I^d have been sacked. I^ve reached the point that I wonder if being polite is of any use as in most cases the politeness is not returned.

Hornbeam, I agree with you.  Customer Service issues are the responsibility of FGW, not NR.  When my wife passed through Mark Hopwood's own station - Pangbourne - yesterday morning there was no staff, no clock (still), nothing on the screens and no announcements.  When she came back in the evening the new "reliable" Oxford screens were showing disinformation.  All down to FGW I think.

It appears that they've pretty much given up on the old system at most stations now.  Most seem to spend their days blank.

It would be nice to get our new system in then. I think I remember it was supposed to be before Christmas.. The old clocks have been gone a long time now..with no obvious work done where the clocks were to suggest why they have been removed so far in advance..

I managed to squeeze into the 7.15 to Swansea. I'm usually all for being given as much detail as possible about the cause of delays, but in this case I think the train manager may have overdone it a bit. He explained the suspected fatality at Iver and then went on to add that due to health and safety regulations we were also delayed due to the train crew needing a break before starting the journey. On a massively overcrowded train full of mildly frustrated passengers, I think probably the first part of the explanation would've sufficed (At least judging by the reactions of the people I was surrounded by ;))

Thanks for posting that, slanted - I agree, sometimes there is a balance to be struck when offering information!

Welcome to the Coffee Shop forum, too!

CfN.  :)

Thanks for the welcome :) Been lurking round these parts for far too long without posting

The poor old T/M cant win.....tell passengers its an operational incident they consider it a lame excuse...tell them the truth and still its not good enough.
Consider the fact that its 90% certain the Train Crew were not just starting work and had possibly been delayed on there inward journey.
They are entitled to a meal break away from the train,although in times of disruption its not uncommon for the T/M to for go his break and get the Train away on time. and have a short break whilst working.
Problem is that the Driver cannot do this, your either driving or having a break..train drivers are akin to lorry drivers after a certain amount of time in the chair they legally have to take a break.and this does not change if everything is disrupted, if anything should happen due to a driver not having a break he is almost certainly legally culpable in court

As a matter of interest, what are the legal limits on driving time?

HGV drivers were given blanket dispensation to exceed their normal hours (only by an extra one IIRC) during the recent cold spell. 
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-11917444 (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-11917444)
So presumably in principle rail drivers could also be given extra time if deemed necessary in the national interest, and with DfT approval ?

Paul

Doubt that would happen for several reasons. EU needs to get involved, ASLEF, RMT etc would start screaming safety case. The rulebook would need to be amended. Some drivers would just refuse (cos they can), TM's might refuse to take a train if they know the drivers on his extra hour.

The legal limits date back to the 1988 Clapham Rail Crash and are known as 'Hidden'

This basically gives a maximum time on duty of 12 hours with a minimum rest between duties of 12 hours.

Within this each company has agreements on the amount of time spent driving and the length of breaks but are based around the Working Time Agreement.

At LTV we have a daily maximum driving time of 8^ hours a day with max 5 hours continuous without any break or turnaround time of between 14 to 30 mins.
The length of the break depends on the time actually on duty and ranges from nothing for a turn under 7 hrs to 45 mins for a turn between 9 to 10 hours.

HSS and Wessex have a different set of agreements.

Southern have a daily max of 8 hours and their max non stop driving is only 3 hours.
Their brakes range from 20 mins for turns under 6 hours to between 30 to 40 mins for turns upto 9^ hours.

Most drivers will normally work the train to its destination in times of disruption before taking any break that they require unless they are approaching the 12 hour rule which is only exceeded in the most extreme cases and needs the authority of a senior manager.

I don't think that we should be moving to a situation where drivers are working longer hours (expect perhaps in very very exceptional circumstances like if a bomb went off in central London and the Government decided to evacuate the capital).  But perhaps at a major terminus it would be cost effective to have a more few "spare drivers" on standby in the peak.  Perhaps if FGW were made financially responsible for all incidents (even those beyond the control of the railway) the financial incentive would be there for them to do more of that kind of thing. 

The "Hidden Report" Anthony Hidden QC carried out the investigation into the Clapham rail crash 12 December 1988, there were a number of recommendations many of them to do with the way S & T renewals and maintenance was conducted and managed it went further as he had discovered, what every one in the industry knew at the time, that excessive hours were being worked by some safety critical staff, his report recommended that a max of 12 hours for a shift with at least 12 hour break with the employer taking into account traveling time to work also 13 days max then a rest day had to be taken, this was referred to "Hidden Hours".  His report was in part instrumental along with the Cannon Street incident at bout the same time where the drive was proved to be under the influence of cannabis to the Transport Works Act 1992 and the D & A testing of safety critical jobs

There is allowance within the current Rule Book and statues for hours to be exceeded which has to be authorised by a senior manager, I have guidance what to do for the guys that work for me should they need to exceed hours.

The break for the driver could be a PNB (Personal Needs Break) cabs do not have toilets those of you who work in an office just think what you would say if your boss said you can not go to the toilet!!!!! have a cup of tea ......

See the Hidden Report (http://www.railwaysarchive.co.uk/docsummary.php?docID=36)



Edit note: No pun intended, but I've amended your link, so that the 'Hidden Report' is no longer 'hidden' ...  :-[  Chris.

A bad start to the week. Fatality at Iver this morning. Not sure which service was involved but the 10:06 Paddington to Penzance was finally terminated at Exeter St David's nearly an hour and a half late. Think the set was then used to form the 12:55 Plymouth to Paddington which was cancelled between Plymouth and Exeter. Not sure what happened to the Pullman service or what effect it will have on the restaurant service on the 19:03 tonight which uses the same catering crew.   

The original set for the 12:55 was used to form an additional service to Penzance from Plymouth in the path of the original 10:06.

Disruption also meant services to Hereford, Great Malvern and Cheltenham Spa were also turned back short.

Just goes to show how an incident can affect people several hundred miles away several hours later - to say nothing, of course, for those immediately affected at the scene.

From the Maidenhead Advertiser (http://www.maidenhead-advertiser.co.uk/news/article-21147-update-woman-pronounced-dead-at-scene-after-being-hit-by-train/):