Great Western Coffee Shop

From the BBC (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-hampshire-12186236):

Video on the Daily Echo website
http://www.dailyecho.co.uk/video/video/108184/

Looks like a FGW 158 that passes after the bike is thrown

I have just watched the CCTV footage. What utter idiots that are about today  >:( :( That could have been much much worse. They must have been waiting for the passing train announcement. A FGW class 158 passes through the station shortly after the sparks were sent flying.

Absolute maniac.


If you look at the time at the bottom right of the picture the bike is thown onto the track approx 17:57:45 and the DMU passes at about 18:00:30-18:00:45, around 3 mins later.

This case just came to court, he got a year's prison sentence...

http://www.dailyecho.co.uk/news/9285848.Yob_locked_up_after_madness_on_railway/

Local radio still reporting that the FGW service was a 'high speed' train...

Paul

Taking nothing away from the idiocy of what he did and I don't know the signalling arrangements there but if the bike was enough to trip the lights on the platform would it not also have had an effect on the signalling?  If the train was three minutes away would it not have encountered at least one signal which would have reverted to red?  Presumably if it had been an electric train it would have lost traction current anyway.

I think the video goes dark because the camera is adjusting its light exposure (as you can tell, I'm not a photographer!)  I can't see this having affected the station lighting as they will be drawing current from different sources.

A bike thrown across the live and running rails wouldn't usually trip anything - it wouldn't cause a low enough resistance. The over current devices are set at thousands of amps, otherwise a few trains together would trip them, and I think the apparent effect on the station lights probably is just due to the camera being confused as suggested.

If train crew want the power off in emergency they have to use a very 'heavy duty' short circuiting device, which is designed to draw enough current to trip the protective devices.  I couldn't say if a traction current failure would automatically result in the signals being altered, but along that line the two aspect signals are quite a distance apart anyway, hence the relatively long headways of 5 or 6 minutes.  There was never really a major risk, as the line speed through Woolston is pretty low due to the tight curve, but it's good to see the courts handing down a significant sentence anyway...

Paul   

I very much doubt the bike 'nearly melted' either!

Totally agree, should have said 'did'.