Wednesday 17 October 2012

There was something very wrong with the passengers yesterday, they were dropping like flies. Someone collapsed on the platform at TCR, another was having a fit on a train at BAN while I had someone pass out at STP. The first I knew about it was when I saw some passengers in the middle of the train waving to attract the attention of the SATS. Some BTP had boarded at TCR so they joined in and while they were dealing with things one of the passengers decided that this was a good time to pull down a handle.

To ensure that no one else joined in the belated handle pulling I made a PA to explain what the holdup was and then called Wood Lane. While waiting for them to answer the passenger was moved of the train by those in attendance and then a miracle. As I was informing Wood Lane that I would have to go back and reset the PEA someone, maybe the SATS or maybe another TOp travelling on the cushions, reset it for me. I closed up and got out of there pronto.

I have had a few notifications from a regular reader of this blog. Firstly management have made the timetables people aware of the problem with graffiti on the mainline shunt at LES and they are going to try their damnedest to get rid of that move. Which is nice.

The practice of flashing the saloon lights and making PAs for sidings reversers is “the old way”, checking that the cars are empty and closing up on the porter buttons was only introduced after a passenger was killed when they fell from a train going into LIS sidings. Trains going into a depot or being taken out of service for a defect are always checked.

5 comments:

  1. I started as a Guard in 1978 and if a train was going to a siding, even just to reverse, the official procedure was you started at the back, checked and porter-buttoned each car in turn, then returned to the rear car and gave the bell if the shunt was off. If you were lucky the Motorman did the front half for you and you met in the middle. There was no "PA three times" as this wasn't fitted on CO/CP & R Stock trains, and even flashing the lights on and off (a practice adopted from LT buses I guess) was frowned upon as supposedly this might lead to someone tripping in poor lighting conditions. Indeed I was told off by an Area Manager after doing this on arrival in Tower Hill bay road. How this is now official procedure in today's H&S obsessed world is beyond me.

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  2. Interesting. All I can guess is that somewhere between getting rid of the guards and the fatality at LIS they adpoted this procedure. I’d never heard of it until I was told that was what they were doing up on the Bakerloo and then someone told me yesterday that it had been the standard practice. I’ve only been with the company since 1997 and didn’t work any sidings reversers when I was on stations so every time a train was going out of service we ‘d tip out on the porter buttons. And I was a H&S Rep on stations so don't get me started......

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  3. Wasn't that Queen's Park incident with the 12 year old boy a train going into a depot?

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    1. See last Saturday's post, I mentioned it. To be honest Queen's Park are sheds rather than a depot, I think it's a 4-track to the west of the station and 2-track to the east.

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  4. To the north and to the south...

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