Railway Ghosts

kesavaross said:
Anyone who works on or near the track has to have a track safety certificate which involves training regardless of the type of traction used. Evening getting or or off the foot plate has training associated with it. A person cannot just decide to get on or off the footplate. To go on to the footplate requires a cab pass. This is all covered is the Rule Book which is regulated by Acts of Parliament and overseen and enforced by the (His Majesties) Railways Inspectorate.

I do know that with steam trains in a platform that under certain strict conditions that a visitor can get on the footplate from the platform. That is simply a step onto it and I can't see how a fatal injury can occur from that.

Also the number of persons on the footplate or in a driving cab is also regulated. For the trains I drove it was no more than 6 people including the driver. An instructor would have a cab pass to allow up to 4 people under training, provided the driver agreed, and they were not allowed to distract the driver in any way.

All the rules and regulations governing the driving of trains to make the system safe have come about by past accidents, crashes and fatalities and it is strictly enforced.

The training and qualification to drive any train, including a steam train, requires certification also and that certification does expire if that type of traction is not driven for a certain time period (which I have no knowledge of in terms of time duration). It also requires a strict 2 yearly examination of both the Rule Book and also actually driving the train. Fail it and the person is no longer allowed to drive and that's it until further training is undertaken and the person then passes. Then there's route knowledge. My point is that it is just not a case of turn up and do this or that as a volunteer, visitor, etc. There are strict rules to follow.

During my years working on the railways I never once heard of a person injured, or killed by an accident getting on of off the footplate. That is not to say it can't happen because unforeseeable accidents do and have happened. I simply find it highly unlikely. When climbing up to the cab or footplate especially from track level the instinct is to hang on tightly to the grab rail because it is higher up than it looks from platform level.
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I joined a project at Moorgate in 2018 that required you to have a track safety certificate to enter certain parts of the building that were, during construction, open to several tube lines.
I was conveniently busy each time a course came up, knowing if I had one I would need to be available during weekends to oversee contractors (with the same training/certificates) and be the representative of the principal contractor in attendance. I never did do a weekend.
 
Many years years ago I was on a steam train pulled by Flying Scotsman, we
stopped for water somewhere on the Carlisle side of the Settle Carlisle it was
before Ribblehead, A female member of the crew climbed onto the running
plate she stepped back and fell back landing on her back and neck by the
side of the track, that's a hell of a fall, she never moved and was taken away
in a ambulance, we never found out what the outcome was, It could have
been Dent station but it's a long time ago.

Jack Warner of Dixon of Dock Green fame had problems walking from
a fall from a steam engine wile making a film.
 
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RaM said:
Many years years ago I was on a steam train pulled by Flying Scotsman, we
stopped for water somewhere on the Carlisle side of the Settle Carlisle it was
before Ribblehead, A female member of the crew climbed onto the running
plate she stepped back and fell back landing on her back and neck by the
side of the track, that's a hell of a fall, she never moved and was taken away
in a ambulance, we never found out what the outcome was, It could have
been Dent station but it's a long time ago.

Jack Warner of Dixon of Dock Green fame had problems walking from
a fall from a steam engine wile making a film.
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Yup, loco cabs are high. I sometimes have to climb in and out of them at work and don't enjoy it.
OK with both hands free to grab the handrails but I'm always carrying equipment.
I always look around for a hunky man to fall on. :bthumbup:
 
Of course there is always the possibility that shock meant that the death of Skargy's railway person was reported as being from the fall but wasn't actually from falling backwards but from something else and the falling onto the platform was a by product? A heart attack whilst on the step or any other kind of health incident might mean that someone would fall - cracking their head and producing a lot of blood - but that the fall was determined not to be the cause of death. If it was something like a photo opportunity - my brother has done these, where you get to stand close to the cab and have your picture taken 'driving the engine', then any untoward publicity arising from said horrible death might well be suppressed in the interests of not killing a goose laying a golden egg, and if the death wasn't actually due to the fall, then it's slightly more plausible that it might be kept quiet.
 
catseye said:
Of course there is always the possibility that shock meant that the death of Skargy's railway person was reported as being from the fall but wasn't actually from falling backwards but from something else and the falling onto the platform was a by product? A heart attack whilst on the step or any other kind of health incident might mean that someone would fall - cracking their head and producing a lot of blood - but that the fall was determined not to be the cause of death. If it was something like a photo opportunity - my brother has done these, where you get to stand close to the cab and have your picture taken 'driving the engine', then any untoward publicity arising from said horrible death might well be suppressed in the interests of not killing a goose laying a golden egg, and if the death wasn't actually due to the fall, then it's slightly more plausible that it might be kept quiet.
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The lack of an ambulance, even though @escargot heard one, would still be a mystery...
 
SimonBurchell said:
The lack of an ambulance, even though @escargot heard one, would still be a mystery...
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Yup, although while an ambulance was mentioned and I heard a siren approaching there's no guarantee of a connection.
The station is on a main road and near the fire station so it's normal to hear passing sirens.
I'd fully expected to meet the ambulance and possibly see someone sent to direct it.
 
catseye said:
Of course there is always the possibility that shock meant that the death of Skargy's railway person was reported as being from the fall but wasn't actually from falling backwards but from something else and the falling onto the platform was a by product? A heart attack whilst on the step or any other kind of health incident might mean that someone would fall - cracking their head and producing a lot of blood - but that the fall was determined not to be the cause of death. If it was something like a photo opportunity - my brother has done these, where you get to stand close to the cab and have your picture taken 'driving the engine', then any untoward publicity arising from said horrible death might well be suppressed in the interests of not killing a goose laying a golden egg, and if the death wasn't actually due to the fall, then it's slightly more plausible that it might be kept quiet.
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An onlooker would assume the fall killed the person. Also, we saw no blood.
Furthermore, as railway workers aren't qualified to pronounce death they wouldn't cover the victim's face.

They'd also be trying to resuscitate him rather than standing around. First-aiders are told to keep on trying until the professionals arrive.

Something had gone on but I dunno what.
 
MorningAngel said:
It was this beauty we went on. I remember the Intercity 125s, so 125mph wasn’t that impressive when granny had already managed it decades ago?
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Now then, we'll have none of that: an Inter-City 125 is cruising at 125mph (#World'sFastestDieselTrain) whereas Mallard was going flat out with a reduced load.

The reliability, speed, facilities and comfort of the IC125 saved BR's bacon at a time the new motorways were severely threatening long-distance rail travel and the Inter-City sector was actually in profit just before privatisation.
 
Paul_Exeter said:
Now then, we'll have none of that: an Inter-City 125 is cruising at 125mph (#World'sFastestDieselTrain) whereas Mallard was going flat out with a reduced load.

The reliability, speed, facilities and comfort of the IC125 saved BR's bacon at a time the new motorways were severely threatening long-distance rail travel and the Inter-City sector was actually in profit just before privatisation.
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Ok fair enough. I just never thought they’d be comparable.

I definitely feel old when the ‘new’ things are now ancient like the 125s. I remember when we stopped having the slam door carriages (which was before a lot of others) and we got excited about the automatic doors or the underground trains that have been out of service for years but it doesn’t seem that long ago since you saw them. Although there are still tube trains going that are a similar age to me. I can’t believe we’re nearly through a quarter of the century. I’m definitely old.
 
escargot said:
Yup, although while an ambulance was mentioned and I heard a siren approaching there's no guarantee of a connection.
The station is on a main road and near the fire station so it's normal to hear passing sirens.
I'd fully expected to meet the ambulance and possibly see someone sent to direct it.
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Would they have a siren if someone was already dead? It does all seem very mysterious...
 
Railway Ghosts, London

Railway Ghosts, The Evening Record (Windsor, Ontario) Vol.XXIII, Nº277, February 13, 1914, p.8.jpg

Source: Railway Ghosts, The Evening Record (Windsor, Ontario) Vol.XXIII, Nº277, February 13, 1914, p.8​
 
Paul_Exeter said:

@WanderingFox​

The Woman in Black​

Punt PI Series 5

Steve Punt turns private investigator, investigating bizarre rumours surrounding the 1928 Charfield rail crash.
2. The Woman in Black. For 25 years following the 1928 Charfield rail crash in Gloucestershire, a woman in black laid flowers at the memorial to the accident. Arriving in a chauffeur driven car, she never revealed her identity but locals have assumed she was in some way related to two young unknown victims of the accident.
The means of this rich woman's arrival has led to feverish speculation - most notably that the was a member of royalty and the children were illegitimate offspring. Add to that questions over the cause of the crash and you have a field day for conspiracy theorists.
Punt sets to work sorting fact from fiction, calling in the experts and cross-examining locals. He gets to grips to with the cause of the crash and gets tantalisingly close to the the possible identity of the woman in black and the two unknown victims.
Producer: Laurence Grissell.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b01mn32c

A fascinating listen
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It was interesting but we don’t really get any definite answers.
 
This may have been posted before, but the most likely explanation for the two unidentified children in the Charfield crash is that they didn't exist.
http://lickeyincline.blogspot.com/2010/12/charfield-train-crash.html
...a Mrs. Smith (nee Ayres) was in the churchyard tending her mother's grave. When we were looking at the memorial she came up and talked to us about it. It transpired that her father, Archie Ayres, had been the local carpenter in 1928 and was regularly employed by the local undertakers, Goscombes, to make coffins.
So he made the coffins for the fifteen people killed in the train crash. According to his daughter, he made thirteen coffins plus two small boxes. The latter contained the remains that could not be associated with particular individuals. According to L T C Rolt (who also perpetuates the story of two children) in his history of railway accidents, Red for Danger, the crash blazed for twelve hours. It is therefore fairly obvious that even in modern times, after a major crash and fire it would be difficult to identify bodies. In 1928, it must have been a nightmare.
Mrs. Smith described how some years after the crash, a reporter from a well-known Sunday newspaper came to interview her father. Once her father had explained the "mystery", the reporter was no longer interested and got up and walked out.
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The means of this rich woman's arrival has led to feverish speculation - most notably that the was a member of royalty and the children were illegitimate offspring.

I've some affection for, and in interest in, the kind of imaginative/sentimental/Romantic explanations which seem an age-old part of British life. Go back some centuries and this 'Woman in Black' might've been described by locals as, say, the Magdalene returning or Henry VIII's disinherited and exiled daughter or some such.
 
eburacum said:
Rolt was a good writer, and a friend of M.R. James, but he erred on the side of imagination.
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There likely were two unidentified victims at Charfield, but not necessarily children. The remains were minimal. A similar story exists regarding Quintinshill.

Doctors and others were not then necessarily fully cognisant at what would happen to a body in a pressurised gas fire.

At least one victim supposed to be at Hawes Junction - known to have caught the train, never seen again - apparently was so burnt as to not be recognisable as a separate person. Before DNA an odd foot and a partial spine would not be capable of being identified as belonging to the same person or not.
 
I'd also heard the story that the children probably never existed. I wonder if the Woman in Black was someone who'd lost her own children and perhaps suffered from mental ill health and so 'translated' her own loss onto the loss of the children. Even if it never happened.
 
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