Network Rail's chief executive has vowed to ‘understand the cause and put immediate additional safety measures in place’ following Wednesday’s derailment in which three people died and six were injured.
On a visit to the site, Andrew Haines offered his condolences and pledged a thorough investigation of the crash.
February 2020: a train passes flooded fields after Storm Dennis
He said: ‘Questions are inevitably being asked as to how this could happen and I am determined that we understand the circumstances that led to this devastating event. It’s too early to draw conclusions but it is critical that we investigate thoroughly and with care, and work closely with rail safety authorities, to make sure this can’t happen again.
‘I will not pre-empt the outcome of the investigation into this awful event, but it is clear the weather was appalling and there were floods and landslips in the area. I have asked my teams to put extra measures in place, from immediate, heightened inspections, to medium-term work with meteorologists to improve information and forecasting.’
Network Rail said the Government had asked it to review its resilience to, and management of, extreme weather. Transport secretary Grant Shapps, who also visited the site, asked Network Rail to produce an interim report by 1 September on ‘wider network resilience'.
It follows a report from the Office of Rail and Road last month in which the regulator warned that Network Rail’s plans to increase resilience are not keeping up with severe weather events and that more needs to be done to tackle the impacts of climate change on the railway.
Following the derailment, Mr Haines said: ‘Our climate is changing and it is increasingly challenging the performance and reliability of the railway, but incidents like yesterday’s devastating accident are incredibly rare, and our railway remains the safest major railway in Europe.
‘Our network was designed for a temperate climate, and it’s challenged when we get extremes such as storms and floods. We’re seeing this more and more and although we can address them on the ground with precautionary measures, we are acutely aware we need a long-term resolution, and we had already secured additional funding and resources to help achieve this.’
The measures he outlined include:
- As an immediate precaution, dozens of sites nationwide with higher-risk trackside slopes, similar to Stonehaven, will be inspected.
- These will be carried out by both in-house engineers and specialist contractors and will be supplemented by helicopter surveys.
- In the light of the current extreme weather conditions Network Rail has mobilised its extreme weather action teams. They already monitor the network and will incorporate immediate learning into their plans as soon as it becomes available.
- In addition, Network Rail is in dialogue with meteorologists to understand how we can strengthen real time information for flash flooding caused by unpredictable extreme weather to inform our train operations, in cooperation with our industry partners.
- Network Rail’s engineers are reviewing its existing programme for remote monitoring of high-risk sites to test whether this can go faster or further.
The Rail Accident Investigation Branch said on Wednesday that it had sent a team of inspectors to the site and launched an investigation.
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