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The St. Neots Derailment 1895 occurred near to St. Neots railway station on 10 November 1895 when a Great Northern Railway Scottish express from Kings Cross encountered a broken rail.
The consist was of eight vehicles: a guard's van, a coach, a Pullman sleeping car (Iona), a corridor coach, another sleeping car, two further coaches and a final guard's van. [1] It was carrying only twenty seven passengers.
At 23:30 on the night of 9 November 1895, the train left Kings Cross on time and proceeded at normal speed, which would have been about 50 mph (80 km/h). It was hauled by one of the GNR's latest and largest of its 8 foot singles, number 1006. [2]
About 40 yards (37 m) south of St Neots, a broken rail derailed the train, the coupling of the second sleeping car parting. The rear part of the train veered to the left and struck a row of goods wagons in a siding to the north of the station. The forward part of the train came to a stand about 1⁄4 mile (400 m) further on. [3]
There was one death, Louisa O'Hara, who was propelled out of the sleeping car and struck her head against a goods wagon. Up to six passengers were reported to have sustained injuries, the guard also having struck his head.
Although the train crew became aware of unusual noises and movement within the train, it was impossible, in the darkness, for them to tell what was amiss. It transpired that a portion of the left hand rail had broken, derailing the coaches, which had scraped along the platform leaving a trail of debris. The coupling of the second sleeping car finally parted as it passed over the crossover to the siding, colliding with a row of coal wagons. It took the brunt of the impact, losing its roof, much of its body work being shattered, and the floor being driven back into the following coach. [1] The next two coaches were thrown partly over and telescoped together, but the guard's van remained virtually undamaged.
Meanwhile, once stationary it was discovered that the front section of the train was also derailed. The first two carriages were undamaged (and were used to carry the uninjured passengers on to Peterborough) but the Pullman car had damage to its wheels and undergear, while the following coach had lost all its glass on the left hand side. It too appeared to have struck some wagons but stayed upright and passed beneath the bridge.
On inspection the fracture faces of the broken rail were clean and bright, so it was clear that no inspection could have previously found a fault. Sir Henry Oakley, the General Manager of the Great Northern Railway stated, "I have no doubt whatever that the disaster was caused by a faulty rail, and by that I mean one of faulty manufacture -- too brittle for its purpose." [3]
Sir Francis Marindin of Her Majesty's Railway Inspectorate suggested that the first fracture of the rail took place over a chair at a minute induced flaw, which did not exist when the rail was manufactured. [4] He also commented on the abnormally heavy axle loading of the locomotive: nearly 20 tons on the driving axle. [2]
After a following accident at Little Bytham, this series of Stirling Singles were rebuilt to reduce the axle load on the driving wheel. They were replaced on the principal expresses in the next few years by Ivatt's Atlantics. Also at this time, cast or wrought iron rails were being replaced with steel and manufacturing processes were steadily improving. Serious accidents due to rail breakage, therefore, remained rare, though a full understanding of crack propagation from internal defects did not come about until the mid-twentieth century and the work of the British Rail Research Division, among others.
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A railroad car, railcar, railway wagon, railway carriage, railway truck, railwagon, railcarriage or railtruck, also called a train car, train wagon, train carriage or train truck, is a vehicle used for the carrying of cargo or passengers on a rail transport network. Such cars, when coupled together and hauled by one or more locomotives, form a train. Alternatively, some passenger cars are self-propelled in which case they may be either single railcars or make up multiple units.
In rail transport, a derailment is a type of train wreck that occurs when a rail vehicle such as a train comes off its rails. Although many derailments are minor, all result in temporary disruption of the proper operation of the railway system and they are a potentially serious hazard.
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Over the latter years of the 19th and early years of the 20th centuries, Penistone in Yorkshire gained a name as an accident black-spot on Britain's railway network; indeed, it could be said to hold the title of the worst accident black-spot in the country. The main line through the town was the Woodhead route of the Manchester, Sheffield and Lincolnshire Railway between Sheffield Victoria and Manchester, London Road. The line was heavily graded with a summit some 400 yards inside the eastern portal of the Woodhead tunnel.
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There have been a number of train accidents on the railway network of Victoria, Australia. Some of these are listed below.
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The Kirtlebridge rail crash took place in 1872 at Kirtlebridge railway station in Dumfriesshire. An express passenger train ran into a goods train that was shunting; 11 people lost their lives immediately, and one further person succumbed later. The cause was a failure to communicate between the station master in charge of the shunting operation, and the signalman. There was not full interlocking of the points, and the block system of signalling was not in use.
There have been a number of train accidents on the South Australian railway network. The first known incident in this list occurred in 1873 in Smithfield.
This is a list of significant railway accidents in Queensland, Australia.
The 1936 Paraparaumu train wreck occurred on Sunday, 30 August 1936 near Paraparaumu, New Zealand. A train was travelling from Auckland to Wellington in heavy rain when it derailed after striking a landslide across the tracks. One passenger died as a result of injuries received in the incident.
The 1887 Hartford Railroad Disaster, also known as the West Hartford Bridge Disaster, occurred on February 5, 1887, near Hartford, Vermont. It remains the deadliest train accident in Vermont's history, resulting in the deaths of approximately 37 individuals and injuring around 50 others.
Railway accidents in 1895 | |
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| Before 1850 |
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| 1850s |
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| 1860s |
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| 1870s |
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| 1880s |
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| 1890s |
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