Well, signalmen Tinsley and Meakin were royally shafted after Quintinshill and driver Morgan of Purley fame got 12 months in the jail and 6 months suspended after pleading guilty for a moment’s inattention, though his sentence was cut to 4 months on appeal and conviction was later quashed altogether.
I was based at Brighton and Jim Morgan was based at Littlehampton which is down the line from Brighton along the coast. Jim Morgan got his job back as a driver shunting trains from the sidings at Littlehampton to the station and visa versa. Getting his job back on the railways was contrary to the rules in the Rule Book which is still governed by acts of Parliament. He should have been sacked and that's it.
The Purley train crash was when an express train going along the up fast line to London ploughed into a commuter train that was on the up slow line but which was going over points to take it on to the up fast line. The express train then went down quite a steep embankment and a lot of it ended up in peoples gardens. The claim was the express train had gone through a red signal at speed immediately prior to the points. I was amazed that more weren't killed or injured.
There was a well known problem with that signal at Purley that had been reported numerous times. It's on the up fast line to London and about 20 miles south of London. The line speed is 90mph. Before the station is a slight incline and a bit of a curve which means the signal is not visible until a short distance before the station. The problems reported were the previous signal being at green and the one at end of the platform being red.
A lot of drivers would slow down before go through Purley station as a precaution due to what other driver had said and reported. I would always slow to around 60mph just in case and then at least the train would stop in time.
Signal always go in sequence. Along that stretch of line they were 4 colour aspects which gave green, two yellows, one yellow and red. A signal can only be at two yellows or green after a green aspect at the previous signal but not red. Jim Morgan claimed the previous signal was green so the one at the end of the platform should not have been displaying red.
During the hearing and on the day Aslef were due to give their evidence to show previous problems with that signal, Aslef suddenly withdrew all their evidence and Jim Morgan changed his plea to guilty.
Later that year train drivers on Network SE got a really decent pay rise.
A few years later Jim Morgan somehow managed to buy a really nice house, much better than the one he owned. He also bought a really nice sailing yacht. Of course, I'm not suggesting for one minute any nefarious went on. No, no, not at all.
Another curiosity was that Margaret Thatcher, the then Prime Minister, visited Jim Morgan in hospital as he was (obviously) injured. Very odd indeed.
The only comment Jim Morgan ever said about the Purley train crash was that he was stitched up. He was never the same person after the crash as he was beforehand though which is understandable.
After the court case a repeater signal was put in quite a way before Purley to give enough stopping distance for a 90mph train. A repeater signal is not like a normal signal. It only has two aspects. On or off. If it's off, it means the next signal to which it applies (at Purley station) could be showing one yellow, two yellows or a green, depending on the aspect of the previous signal, or if it's on, it means the next signal to which it applies is red.
If there was no problems with the signal at Purley, then why was the repeater signal installed ASAP with a line speed restriction until that had been done?
