Wrong kind of weather (again)

chriscooper · Post by **chriscooper** » Thu Jan 08, 2004 11:06 pm

Just been looking at the online train running info and was not at all suprised to get all the usual problems we expect from the railways in this country due to a bit of bad weather. Once again Virgins Voyagers were refusing to travel along the sea wall at Dawlish incase they got wet with two actually failing and blocking the line up but being cleared only for the signalling in the area to fail. Also suprise suprise no Electrics could run between Darlington and Durham due to problems with the power supply. Then their are also the various tree's on the line (no inflatable dingies this time though) plus the problems at Clapham Junction and of cource the usual problems which occur. Overall one of those days you wonder why people bother travelling on trains. At least other forms of transport arn't totally immune though with roads closed due to fallen trees etc. Wrong kind of heat, wrong kind of wind, suppose we should be glad we havn't had snow yet

.

nightbeaver911 · Post by **nightbeaver911** » Fri Jan 09, 2004 10:56 am

It is strange how we just stop if we get any sort of weather, I know last summer we had some great extreemes and much of Europes rail system was affected but the swiss cope with snow and no doubt other countries they get two feet of snow and still run we get two inches and grind to a halt. Whats with our approach? We just give up when it snows and say lets not bother today.

mattvince · Post by **mattvince** » Fri Jan 09, 2004 2:43 pm

Ok, out of the problems mentioned:
Voyagers: I thought we'd explained this before: Salt Water+Electro-Dynamic Brakes=PROBLEMS! Short-Circuiting of the Dynamic's resistors to be precise.
Signalling: Could be anything, possibly water ingress into control cabinets, corrosion, or track circuits not detecting the trains (excess water problem).
ECML Wires: Shoddy construction courtesy British Rail!
Trees: Nothing you can really do about them, just move them away as they fall.
Clapham: Something went wrong, HMRI will (hopefully) investigate, although I think the new RAIB should get the lead.

And these problems do occur in Europe, it's just that we never get told about them! Like we never get told about SNCF strikes, incidents on Europe's railways, and major train crashes (notably in Spain) are given scant attention. Double standards on media reporting? Yep, I think so.

nightbeaver911 · Post by **nightbeaver911** » Fri Jan 09, 2004 8:35 pm

Fair point, there was an article in Rail saying how good our rail system it is just a) we dont know it or some of us dont at least e.g. me b) the media is very unfair on it.

petermakosch · Post by **petermakosch** » Fri Jan 09, 2004 8:54 pm

We're all Lazy maybe?
Little Bit of Snow, and "NO..... I WILL NOT RUN MY TRAIN.... BLAH....BLAH...BLAH....BLAH"

I dunno though, I like Bad weather

slipdigby · Post by **slipdigby** » Sat Jan 10, 2004 2:01 am

petermakosch wrote:We're all Lazy maybe?
Little Bit of Snow, and "NO..... I WILL NOT RUN MY TRAIN.... BLAH....BLAH...BLAH....BLAH"

Nice balanced and well reported BS I see there, ever thought about a job in the "popular" press?

Let's get something straight about this "wrong sort of snow" issue.

Firstly, Countries such as Austria and Switzerland deal with snow better because they get heavy amounts of snow on many of their routes for a large percentage of the year. Fancy paying for all these contingency measures "just in case" it snows, rains meteors or the earth's polarity inverts itself? There's a happy medium, but the meeja like to ignore that for the sake of good copy.

Secondly, the entire "wrong sort of snow" (mis) quote comes from the fact that when it does snow in Britain, we tend to get maritime precipitation, that tends to be pretty heavy and slushy. No problem for the railways, except in heavy amounts. What occured at this event was that the snow came from the north and continent, which happened to be much powdery and therefore much more likely to be sucked into the business parts of trains.

Slip

nightbeaver911 · Post by **nightbeaver911** » Sat Jan 10, 2004 12:52 pm

Yes but you have to admit nothing works when it snows, its most peoples attitudes. If it snows heavily everyone seems treats it like a bank holiday and dont go anywhere because their little road was not gritted.

nwallace · Post by **nwallace** » Sat Jan 10, 2004 2:34 pm

AS put by a finnish mate:

It seems when you get a little bit of snow here you all panic... this is the scottish idea of a little bit of snow btw

Well when the M25 got all of a couple of inches it groudn to a hault. And up here we stop when were talking in feet... seems the fins stop when they are talking in 10s of meters