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Originally Posted by Oberon
I presume by traffic regulator you mean what we in English would call a signalman or dispatcher? This would correlate with what krazyni put as well in that both trains got a clear aspect. One would have thought in this day and age that there would be something in the computing system that would have picked this up and flashed up a warning to the signalman that he was about to clear a train onto an occupied block.
Of course, it's possible that the signal itself was at fault and showed a clear aspect when it should have shown a danger, this is what caused the train crash at Clapham Junction back in 1989 because of rushed engineering work an old wire had not been isolated and as a result 35 people died and nearly 500 were injured.
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In Savonia case such conflicting route assignment should have been impossible as computer system which controlled signals and points in that railway at the time should have prevented it from happening. I don't remember what turned out to be the problem here.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Oberon
Human error in the signalling department wouldn't surprise me though, there are plenty of crashes in history which can be traced to that, the worst train crash in the UK was primarily down to signalling error, and it goes to show that despite all the computer back-ups we put into a system, it's still only as strong as its weakest point, which is invariably the fleshy thing operating it. |
Unfortunately that is very true. In 1996 Jokela rail accident was caused by train driver missing signal and as result coming at excessive speed into junction and derailed. In 1998 Jyväskylä rail accident train approaching Jyväskylä railway station came at excessive speed to points most likely because (tired) train driver was driving by routine (based on reconstruction) and missed signals indicating changed routing. In normal routing train goes through 80 km/h points closer to station, but in changed route there was 35 km/h points farther away from station.
In 1998 Suonenjoki rail accident InterCIty train departing station passed signal at danger, drove through points and crashed head on with freight train. In this case driving through points (forcing them off their original position) triggered alarm in dispatchers panel but by then trains had already crashed.
Common nominator in all those accidents was lack of any onboard proteection system like your TPWS or PZB. Implementation of such systems was progressing slowly and only after two consecutive fatal accidents (Jokela and Jyväskylä) was program accelerated and considered urgent. This despite several near disasters, rear endings speeding incidents and so on over years. Implementation - albeit in more limited form - began slightly before 1956 Kuurila rail disaster
and was completed in main lines in early 21st century. Many secondary and branch lines (some with passenger service) still do not have any such system.
Writing this somewhat off topic post reminded me of another failure point. I don't know what is situation with German safety systems but until last year (any maybe still in some locomotives) ours is as standard turned off and must be turned on by train driver. This is done manually every time train is moved first time from that control position (cab in MU and box cab locos, control stand in hood units). That changed only after 2014 Hyvinkää incident where driver of commuter train forgot to turn system on and as result there was no protection from his second error of coming at excessive speed into points. Fortunately that didn't end into derailment.