Thirsk Rail Crash, 31st July 1967

[gimmea50anyday]

This was 50 years ago today when Class 50 prototype DP2 was wrecked south of thirsk following the derailment of a cement train. Incredibly the closed Harrogate-Northallerton line was reopened and used for diversions while this incident was cleared up

http://www.thenorthernecho.co.uk/hi...air_____the_Thirsk_rail_disaster_50_years_on/

“I WAS standing at one window and my wife was at the other as we couldn’t get a seat,” Mr JW Roe, 64, of Shildon, told reporters exactly 50 years ago on July 31, 1967.

He’d joined the East Coast Main Line express at York expecting to get off at Darlington, but at 3.17pm, as the train neared Thirsk… “Suddenly, where the wife was standing, the coach seemed to dissolve in mid air, and the doorway fell around her,” he continued.

 

[Blindtraveler]

An interesting bit of history I didnt know. Thanks for sharing.

 

[gimmea50anyday]

The accident report on the disaster can be found here

http://www.railwaysarchive.co.uk/eventsummary.php?eventID=123

 

[gimmea50anyday]

And the Wikipedia entry can be found here

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thirsk_rail_crash_(1967)

 

[Blindtraveler]

Thats my bed time reading sorted then!

 

[gimmea50anyday]

Interestingly the engine out of DP2 was placed into the class 50 spares pool and was used in a number of examples over its life. It's final use was in 50037 Illustrious where it suffered engine failure putting a leg out of bed. The engine was then placed into 50046 as the power plant has been removed to revive 50050 as D400 and shipped to Booths for scrap.

 

[eastdyke]

This was 50 years ago today when Class 50 prototype DP2 was wrecked south of thirsk following the derailment of a cement train. Incredibly the closed Harrogate-Northallerton line was reopened and used for diversions while this incident was cleared up

http://www.thenorthernecho.co.uk/hi...air_____the_Thirsk_rail_disaster_50_years_on/

Thank you for posting.

A very stark reminder to us all, should a reminder be needed, that the operation of a safe railway is always the imperative.

 

[theblackwatch]

There's a feature on this crash in the July issue of Railway Magazine. It mentioned how the driver of DP2 attended to wounded passengers, and it also sounds like he decked a local press photographer!

 

[John Webb]

There is a short article on the temporary reopening of the Harrogate-Northallerton line for down trains in "Railways around Harrogate - Volume 3" by Martin Bairstow, published 1998, ISBN 1 871944 18 X. This line had closed in March that year, but all was still intact, partly due to a daily freight train to Ripon and an MOD site at Melmerby 'as required'. Within 4 hours of the accident the down line was passed as fit to be used, and was used for diverted trains until the 2nd of August. Around 9 signal boxes had to be manned for this to happen, and trains were dealt with at up to four an hour.

 

[lincolnshire]

I can remember going up to Newcastle after the crash and the cement wagons was still in the field next door to the railway awaiting removal.

Also the coaches that was damaged was sheeted over and stored in the York Carriage Works sidings next to Holgate Road awaiting either repair or scrapping.

 

[Taunton]

Also mentioned in Gerry Fiennes "I Tried to Run a Railway", where he makes further positive comments about the footplate crew. Fiennes was GM of the ER at the York HQ at the time, and went straight to the scene. I'm sure the crew were grateful for the "nose" that was a feature of earlier English Electric designs rather than the flat front cab of other designers.

Regarding reuse of the engine from the loco, one detailed account of the Class 50 stated that quite early on two engines were beyond repair due to crankshaft failure, one was replaced by the unit from DP2, but there were still only 49 engines for the 50 locos, so there was always one loco standing engineless thereafter. Both DP2 and the Class 50 in earlier days were actually the property of English Electric, not BR.

 

[DidcotDickie]

Also mentioned in Gerry Fiennes "I Tried to Run a Railway", where he makes further positive comments about the footplate crew. Fiennes was GM of the ER at the York HQ at the time, and went straight to the scene. I'm sure the crew were grateful for the "nose" that was a feature of earlier English Electric designs rather than the flat front cab of other designers.

Think this might be him in one of the pics in the linked-to article above:

http://www.thenorthernecho.co.uk/hi...he_Thirsk_rail_disaster_50_years_on/#gallery1

Possibly the gent on the left of the three nearest the camera? Eyebrows are a bit of a give-away.

 

[70014IronDuke]

That first carriage looks like a full brake, which was rather fortuitous or a few more might have been killed.

 

[Taunton]

Think this might be him in one of the pics in the linked-to article above:

http://www.thenorthernecho.co.uk/hi...he_Thirsk_rail_disaster_50_years_on/#gallery1

Possibly the gent on the left of the three nearest the camera? Eyebrows are a bit of a give-away.

It most certainly is.

Given some of the other heavy repair jobs BR workshops did in the 1960s-70s, the loco looks almost repairable, and I suspect if it had been a Deltic it would have been. I presume being a one-off, not actually owned by the railway told against this.

The English Electric "nose" ahead of the crew was not some idle design idea, but came from their long experience of overseas railways, where collisions with various obstacles had always been almost standard compared to Britain. Likewise the USA, where noses give considerable crew protection from innumerable level crossing mishaps, let alone landslides and other hazards. Steam locomotives, of course, had long placed the crew well back.