Latest Rail News

15.04.15

Train derails outside Brighton station

An empty passenger train has derailed outside Brighton station, stopping all trains from running in and out of the station.

The incident occurred just before 2pm as an empty Southern Rail train left the station. It has caused significant delays on all services in the area. The cause of the derailment is currently under investigation.

Southern Rail has warned passengers to expect a delay of up to 90 minutes on all trains passing through the area.

Network Rail said in a statement: “An empty train derailed at low speed as it left a depot near Brighton station shortly before 2pm today. As a result of the derailment, no trains have been able to run in or out of the station since then.

“Efforts are being made to begin services as soon as possible and Network Rail and operators Southern and Thameslink will update passengers on progress.

“The cause of the derailment is under investigation.”

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Comments

Elliott   15/04/2015 at 17:11

Its not the first time its happened there....and it wont be the last until they put a proper signal and AWS warning in place...but it all boils down to money...and penny pinching.. Southern and Network rail are too busy employing pen pushers with fancy job titles to bother with basic safety.. This could easily of been a collision and lives lost..!!

Neil Palmer   15/04/2015 at 17:36

That's what happens when you have a company run by accountants. They know the price of everything and the value of nothing.

Ian Mcdonald   17/04/2015 at 12:41

Even with all the tracks available and clearly visible in the picture, no trains ran for 90 minutes. This deplorable over-reaction and prolonged failure to keep other trains moving is unfortunately not untypical of Network Rail and TOCs' tendency to bring everything to a standstill and make excuses for inaction, rather than dealing with such accidents and failures quickly, and especially when spare capacity clearly exists.

Kev Smith   17/04/2015 at 13:02

could have been worse, steelwork and signalling defiency, its a very heavily used section, so perhaps inspections need increasing?? how was driver, no one likes falling off, its horrible feeling..ive done it once(preserved railway driving). I felt very foolish...

John Grant   18/04/2015 at 10:25

@Ian: I read that it fouled the live rail and took out all the power in the area. Of course, if the system was designed for resilience you'd expect each route to have its own power supply, but ...

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