Testing London's response to a major incident- Old D Stock broken up

[Simon11]

Hi

Very interesting video

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-35683999

Simon

 

[HMS Ark Royal]

Hi

Very interesting video

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-35683999

Simon

Last time they did something like this, they used Tower Hill and some C stock

 

[edwin_m]

Someone can be happy that the number of Mr Shooter's conversions has probably been reduced by four...

 

[Nym]

Given that at least four of the eight are trailers, and I didn't spot any motor bogies, I doubt it...

 

[ralphchadkirk]

Last time they did something like this, they used Tower Hill and some C stock

This is significantly bigger than the Tower Hill exercise!

 

[Dstock7080]

More pictures here:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/terrorism-in-the-uk/12177367/Tower-block-collapses-into-underground-station-in-Europes-biggest-disaster-training-exercise.html

©PA
all 8 cars dispatched were trailer cars: 17001 17008 17039 17041 17060 17072 17122 17125

 

[theageofthetra]

Has anyone ever taken part in one of these exercises? I know someone who did a maritime one and said it was completely terrifying!

 

[ralphchadkirk]

Has anyone ever taken part in one of these exercises? I know someone who did a maritime one and said it was completely terrifying!

Well I took a very small part in it today from the comfort of my sofa, but there's quite a lot of my colleagues there at the moment.

 

[Llanigraham]

Has anyone ever taken part in one of these exercises? I know someone who did a maritime one and said it was completely terrifying!

Did a car crash one for the motorsport recovery and ambulance guys, and it was very realistic.
Also did a few for St John in the past.

Know of a couple of people who joined an exercise at a certain "establishment" in Hereford and they said that really was frightening!

 

[theageofthetra]

Its a pan-european operation involving rescue services from a number of different countries. The location is the disused Littlebrook powerstation near Dartford - I wonder did anyone see the LU stock taken down there?

 

[SpacePhoenix]

Last time they did something like this, they used Tower Hill and some C stock

I think that might have been the one featured on a tv series called "The Tube".

As a side note, are there many D stock trains in service still or have the S stock trains finally taken over all District line trains?

 

[HMS Ark Royal]

I think that might have been the one featured on a tv series called "The Tube".

As a side note, are there many D stock trains in service still or have the S stock trains finally taken over all District line trains?

Yeah, thats it...

D stock remains in service...

I believe that the weekday early evening Olympia runs are still booked as D Stock runs due to the train numbers

 

[Class 170101]

Well I took a very small part in it today from the comfort of my sofa, but there's quite a lot of my colleagues there at the moment.

Armchair controller.

 

[HMS Ark Royal]

Armchair controller.

I was going to say Fat Controller, but I am too much of a gentleman

 

[ralphchadkirk]

Armchair controller.

All I had to do was provide my availability to respond as if it was a real major incident. My contribution is receiving a text and sending an email reply!

 

[14xxDave]

Well a friend of mine who is a member of the the HART team in the Northeast was down there together with his mates. So this isn't just London....

 

[ralphchadkirk]

Well a friend of mine who is a member of the the HART team in the Northeast was down there together with his mates. So this isn't just London....

The exercise involves mutual aid from other areas of the country, and EU member states providing assistance as well (I think teams from the EU arrive on Wednesday).

 

[theironroad]

While these exercises are good (even at £770,000), they lack any element of surprise for the services involved.

They should be planned in secret and rolled out as a real time incident.

One of the spokespersons on the news today was so pre-scripted that it was embarrassing.

Do the incident with the confusion, lack of info and andrelanine of a real life incident and far more lessons could be learnt to improve future provision.

 

[Clip]

While these exercises are good (even at £770,000), they lack any element of surprise for the services involved.

They should be planned in secret and rolled out as a real time incident.

One of the spokespersons on the news today was so pre-scripted that it was embarrassing.

Do the incident with the confusion, lack of info and andrelanine of a real life incident and far more lessons could be learnt to improve future provision.

And the trauma faced by the emergency services involved on a finding such devastation and then B finding out it was all make believe?

 

[Simon11]

While these exercises are good (even at £770,000), they lack any element of surprise for the services involved.

They should be planned in secret and rolled out as a real time incident.

One of the spokespersons on the news today was so pre-scripted that it was embarrassing.

Do the incident with the confusion, lack of info and andrelanine of a real life incident and far more lessons could be learnt to improve future provision.

I got the impression that it was conducted in the light?

Surely, if we're dealing with a tower on top of a tube station, there would be no light.

 

[theironroad]

And the trauma faced by the emergency services involved on a finding such devastation and then B finding out it was all make believe?

Well that's how the navy at least prepare for real life, possibly asleep then told their ship is sinking, although the real time alerts will be prefaced 'for exercise'.

 

[HMS Ark Royal]

Well that's how the navy at least prepare for real life, possibly asleep then told their ship is sinking, although the real time alerts will be prefaced 'for exercise'.

More along the lines of

"For Exercise, For Exercise, For Exercise - <insert random announcement here>"

 

[theironroad]

I got the impression that it was conducted in the light?

Surely, if we're dealing with a tower on top of a tube station, there would be no light.

Well as we've all been told it will last 4 days, I'm not sure how it will pan out, but certainly the site looked very well lit when shown on the news today.

I hope, for reality, that they have real people sending tweets to lul in real time demanding to know why they haven't been rescued within 2 mins, and how selfish it is for a tower block to collapse as they will miss their *important* meeting, and how they can claim delayrepay or something...,
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

​

More along the lines of

"For Exercise, For Exercise, For Exercise - <insert random announcement here>"

Indeed, but I'm far too lazy atm.

 

[HMS Ark Royal]

​

Indeed, but I'm far too lazy atm.

Can't help it... My old man was in the Grey Funnel Line for a few years - got some good tales from his time in the Andrew!

 

[OneOffDave]

While these exercises are good (even at £770,000), they lack any element of surprise for the services involved.

They should be planned in secret and rolled out as a real time incident.

One of the spokespersons on the news today was so pre-scripted that it was embarrassing.

Do the incident with the confusion, lack of info and andrelanine of a real life incident and far more lessons could be learnt to improve future provision.

One of the problems with a no-notice approach this is you'd have to take those responding from frontline provision then backfill with people who are off duty which takes time and would put lives at risk. This risk would be acceptable in a real incident but not during a planned exercise. There's also the potential for confusion as to whether it is a real or exercise incident in no-notice exercises, especially if the media haven't been pre-briefed.

Given the scale and number of people involved in putting this exercise on, I doubt it could have been arranged without staff in the responding agencies being aware of it.

I've been involved in a large number of exercises both in the UK and Europe wide and this is the largest I've seen. The only thing I think that's larger since the war was the exercise mobilisation of the army into Germany from the UK as part of the cold war practices.

As for the lighting, one of the key elements of an exercise like this is that you don't create any real casualties and, if required you can evacuate everyone at short notice.

 

[theironroad]

One of the problems with a no-notice approach this is you'd have to take those responding from frontline provision then backfill with people who are off duty which takes time and would put lives at risk. This risk would be acceptable in a real incident but not during a planned exercise. There's also the potential for confusion as to whether it is a real or exercise incident in no-notice exercises, especially if the media haven't been pre-briefed.

Given the scale and number of people involved in putting this exercise on, I doubt it could have been arranged without staff in the responding agencies being aware of it.

I've been involved in a large number of exercises both in the UK and Europe wide and this is the largest I've seen. The only thing I think that's larger since the war was the exercise mobilisation of the army into Germany from the UK as part of the cold war practices.

As for the lighting, one of the key elements of an exercise like this is that you don't create any real casualties and, if required you can evacuate everyone at short notice.

I realise the no notice approach could be problematic in terms of taking staff of the normal day job and being able to respond to an exercise without impacting the front line. Giving advance notice of required overtime would just raise suspicio ns, so unless people are brought into work on a pretence of another event (which itself is problematic), there is probably no really ideal way of doing a real life, surprise exercise.

 

[Railengineer]

Shame to put those underground vehicles to waste. That's less available to convert for running on the northern powerhouse. They could have used a 442 surely?

 

[bramling]

Shame to put those underground vehicles to waste. That's less available to convert for running on the northern powerhouse. They could have used a 442 surely?

Had they not been used for this exercise these particular vehicles would most likely have been scrapped as they are all trailers - Vivarail have only purchased the motored vehicles - DMs and UNDMs. Apart from those retained by LU for engineering use all withdrawn trailers have so far been sent to Booths of Rotherham.

It's still a shame to see non-life-expired trains scrapped though. Were it not for the economics of the S stock order and the associated SSR upgrades, the D stock could easily have continued reliably in service for another 10-15 years, as other LU stocks have done.

 

[Dstock7080]

Had they not been used for this exercise these particular vehicles would most likely have been scrapped as they are all trailers - Vivarail have only purchased the motored vehicles - DMs and UNDMs. Apart from those retained by LU for engineering use all withdrawn trailers have so far been sent to Booths of Rotherham.

VivaRail is taking DM and trailers cars, no UNDM cars have gone to VivaRail.

 

[edwin_m]

I can understand that the people involved would be given notice that an exercise was scheduled, two reasons being to ensure that extra cover was provided in case of a real incident, and to lessen the risk of somebody getting the wrong end of the stick and believing it was real.

However I'm rather surprised that details of the scenario were released to the media before it happened. This would surely give anyone involved who had seen the coverage some detailed knowledge they wouldn't have in a real incident, and even if only subconsciously this would affect their response. For example it was stated that there was only one way into the "scene" and it involved removing a pile of rubble.

I think a better approach to publicity would have been to report that an exercise was being held in a particular area (to avoid alarming people unnecessarily) but not to release any details until afterwards. If the exercise site was to be irreversibly damaged by the exercise then reports could be filmed before but embargoed until later.