Cable Theft Bridgwater (19 December 2009)

[whole diary]

[devon_metro]

Lots of disruption. From the FGW^▸ (First Great Western) wesbite:

Saturday 19th December 2009.    Time: 11:55

Signalling problems are continuing in the Taunton area. First Great Western services between Bristol, Taunton, Westbury and the West, in both directions are being have been disrupted.
Customers are advised that limited rail services are operating. Customers are advised to expect an extended rail journey until at least mid afternoon today.

A limited Road Replacement service will be in operation between Weston-Super-Mare and Taunton,in both directions,via Bridgewater and Highbridge & Burnham.

South West Trains will accept First Great Western customers on services from Exeter and Westbury via Salisbury to London Waterloo.

Further updates to follow.

[Super Guard]

Just updated:

Saturday 19th December 2009.    Time: 12:40

The earlier signalling problems in the Taunton area are now in full operation. First Great Western services are starting to return to advertised timetable.Customers are advised that some delays may still occur in the short term.

[Timmer]

The title of this thread answers my question as to what was behind this mornings signalling problems in the Taunton area. Does anyone know how this ever increasing crime can be stopped?

[Electric train]

It is a constant battle the quicker we come up with making new equipment and cables secure the toerags move onto more remote sites, last weekend in the East Clandon / Merrow area (near Guildford) of SWT^▸ (South West Trains) thieves attempted to steal a cable unfortunately for them is was a LIVE 33,000 volt cable they must have been injured but there was no evidence of serious injury or death, the cost to NR^» (Network Rail - home page) was in the order ^100,000 to repair the damaged cable, there was also the reported cable theft in the Colchester area which caused a fire.

In a lot of incidences these thieves put their lives at risk but more worryingly they put the lives of railway staff at risk especially when the earthing conductors at substations is stolen as there is then a danger that substation metal work can rise to a lethal voltage with respect to the mass of earth.

[grahame]

Does anyone know how this ever increasing crime can be stopped?

Use wireless technology and in-cab signalling?  The only wires left being the 33Kv ones ...

[Super Guard]

It got worse... there was a points failure at Cogload Junction (near Taunton), which bought the mainline back to a standstill.

Friday's 2145 Pad-Exeter got back at around 6am in the morning due to the cable theft!  (Passengers were taxied when it became clear that they weren't going anywhere).

[thetrout]

Yes... I wondered what caused the delays mid - late afteroon...

I was in Taunton planning to catch the 16:53 to BRI^» (Bristol Temple Meads - next trains)... but that was delay by 25 mins.. Pretty much everything heading South of Taunton was showing as Delayed... I ended up on the 15:51 Service which ended up leaving a good 40 mins late

After speaking to some of my friends who were heading to cornwall... some of them arrived in Plymouth a good 100 minutes late...!

[broadgage]

Does anyone know how this ever increasing crime can be stopped?

Use wireless technology and in-cab signalling?  The only wires left being the 33Kv ones ...

That would help to an extent since there would no/far fewer signaling cables to steal.
The use of fibre optic data cables also helps to an extent since these have no scrap value.

The main problem though is the theft of power cables, these contain a lot of metal and are valuable to thieves.
Thieves can and do steal cables carrying lethal voltages, and as pointed out above,  the theft of substation earthing conductors is a growing problem.