Re: Indian Pacific hits freight train - Who's the Responsible Investigating body?

[aprice@mail.dotcom.fr (Andrew Price)]

On Thu, 26 Aug 1999 00:42:55 GMT, Mike.Roebuck@ cobblers.datacomm.ch
(Michael Roebuck) wrote:

>On Wed, 25 Aug 1999 22:41:43 GMT, gonoNOCRAP@bigpond.com wrote:
>
>>On Thu, 26 Aug 1999 02:07:02 +1000, David Johnson
>><trainman@ozemail.com.au> wrote:
>>
>
>>Come on David the sand on Cowan bank thing was a major cop out i do
>>not believe for one second the whole train was insulated from the
>>track circuit the probability of that would be infinitesimal that
>>story was to appease the press!!!
>>regards Paul Johnston (MNRC)
>
>I don't know the background to this one, as I wasn't lurking here when
>it happened, but I can tell you that a freight train load of salt
>which derailed near Preston, England, two years ago did indeed knock
>out all the track circuits, and the London - Glasgow main line was in
>chaos for days because of it.

Are you both talking about the same thing?  There have been a number
of stories over the years (some real, some probably apocryphal) about
sand applied during braking building up an insulating layer on the
rails and preventing the train from shunting the track circuit, hence
leaving the section signal at green and causing an accident.

I would imagine that the salt would probably have had the opposite
effect - if it was dumped all over the track, it would effectively
lower the ballast resistance and cause the track circuit to be
permanently "down" and the signals at red.