Is it safe?

[Mickey]

Personally i wouldn't wear ALL OVER BRIGHT ORANGE gear it looks so NON-railway and so un-professional thought up by NON-railway people.

Personally i'm sick to death of this so called 'risk free' society thats been created.

A bit of risk adds a bit of spice to life!.

[mr B]

hows about 2 men on the footplate ... now adays its at least 4 (steam) on the main line ,


mr b

[strang steel]

Wasn't it Douglas Bader who said, -

Rules are there to be obeyed by fools, but merely for the guidance of the wise?

[Bryan]

After working on the tracks on the National network most rail staff have the same opinion. That is It's the slow speed lines that kill you, you are all to aware of the speed of trains on the high speed lines and therefore the awareness level rises.
From personal experience any close encounters that I have seen have never been on the ECML but on lines like the Rystone branch or the Hull dock line. Both slow speed and trains run as and when.

[Mickey]

I believe i recall that a number of 'lookout men' were killed (separate incidents) on the Kings Cross area south of Hitchin back in the 1970s?. These lookout men weren't in a 'place of safety' when looking out for the rest of the gang and were struck by passing trains.

A lookout man can find himself up in the dock on a 'man slaughter' charge if they aren't doing there lookout duties properly and a person or person's are killed.

[StevieG]

I think we first got issued with the initial orange mini-vest (with orange rubber buttons) in about early 1970.
Before that it was just 'issue' overalls (if you had a right to any: If not workshirt and jeans was one answer), and any boots/shoes and coats that were issued and/or suitable for the actual work to be done. (PLUS, good, reliable lookouts!)

Dunno Stevie i've seen pictures & film footage of B.R. p.way staff out working on the track with 'small yellow jackets' around the mid-1960s just in the last couple of years of the end of steam in 1968.

I can't dispute what you're saying there Micky. I just meant that at the depot where I was first allocated, my gang (and the whole of the depot I think) were working without them in '69, and I heard no mention that it was then 'illegal' to do so.
Maybe what you've seen were in an area(s) trialling HV items before national introduction.

[Mickey]

I think we first got issued with the initial orange mini-vest (with orange rubber buttons) in about early 1970.
Before that it was just 'issue' overalls (if you had a right to any: If not workshirt and jeans was one answer), and any boots/shoes and coats that were issued and/or suitable for the actual work to be done. (PLUS, good, reliable lookouts!)

Dunno Stevie i've seen pictures & film footage of B.R. p.way staff out working on the track with 'small yellow jackets' around the mid-1960s just in the last couple of years of the end of steam in 1968.

I can't dispute what you're saying there Micky. I just meant that at the depot where I was first allocated, my gang (and the whole of the depot I think) were working without them in '69, and I heard no mention that it was then 'illegal' to do so.
Maybe what you've seen were in an area(s) trialling HV items before national introduction.

Now you have me wondering Stevie if i did see them as early as circa 1966 but i'm almost certain that p.way staff were wearing the 'small yellow jacket' by maybe 1968/69 it would be interesting to know exactly when they were introduced by B.R.?.

[hq1hitchin]

Now you have me wondering Stevie if i did see them as early as circa 1966 but i'm almost certain that p.way staff were wearing the 'small yellow jacket' by maybe 1968/69 it would be interesting to know exactly when they were introduced by B.R.?.

Can remember taking a footplate ride to P'boro on the 14:20 ex KX one afternoon in 1971 and the driver pointing out to me how much easier it was to see the p.way staff who were wearing them as opposed to those that weren't. A year later, the GN suburban electrification scheme started and they were then quite common but not universally worn. A chap called Norman Garbutt, who was Chief P Way Inspector, wore a long full length one, which I believe he brought with him when he came from the LMR. All the others I saw then were the small ones with rubber buttons. By 1975, still not all grades were wearing them, and when I left Crewe to come back south in 1984, the passenger shunters there still rarely wore them. Phased in gradually is the phrase, I suppose.

[Mickey]

Well i can honestly say that i still have a B.R. small YELLOW (not ORANGE) jacket with about 3 rubber buttons which i STILL use while on the 'official walking route' (about 20 yards long) to my place of work PLUS i STILL have a 1972 British Rail Red 'bendy rule book' in my possession as well (but not in use).

[PinzaC55]

Well i can honestly say that i still have a B.R. small YELLOW (not ORANGE) jacket with about 3 rubber buttons which i STILL use while on the 'official walking route' (about 20 yards long) to my place of work PLUS i STILL have a 1972 British Rail Red 'bendy rule book' in my possession as well (but not in use).

I used to have one of them at Kings Cross and for some reason the buttons melted! I think this wasn't uncommon?

[Hermit 109]

The railways are certainly safer nowadays, during my time at King's Cross, we lost 3 footplate crew in accidents. Charlie Kilford & his mate at Hatfield and Maurice Holman at Harringay. While I was at Waterloo I lost two good friends in the Clapham crash & another & his mate working a ballast train on the Kensington Branch.

I seem to remember a rule book instruction relating to fatalities on running lines, where if possible the footplate crew had to mark the position of the body, then move it away from the running line, proceed at caution & report it to the next signal box, things were a bit different in those days. Tried to find the relevant passage in my old 1950 rule book but passage of time and cold in my loft beat me.

There were several accidents on the GN while I was at the 'Cross, some serious and some not so. There was the sleeper derailment caused by the crazy signalman at Connington South, the rear end collision in fog on the up at Connington North, a major derailment at Lincoln on a diverted service & a rear end collision on the up goods at Finsbury Park with empty stock, fortunately with no loss of train crew lives. On the lighter side I can remember going to Hertford with the breakdown crew to rescue a loco that had overrun the stops in the bay and made a brave attempt to join the traffic in the road below. After much digging out and preparation a steel rope was attached between our 47 and the stricken loco and we started to haul it back up, however after moving it a couple of feet the steel rope snapped, threatening to decapitate anyone in the vicinity, so we gave up and left it for the following day.

Fortunately, those sort of things are a rare nowadays, I don't think yellow vests have been particularly instrumental, but better training, monitoring of safety critical staff and improvements in safety equipment such as TPWS have played a greater part.

[Mickey]

Personally the closes i every came to nearly being killed on the railway happened about 40 years ago when i had just walked down the outside staircase to WELWYN GARDEN CITY s/box turned sharp right and without looking started to walk across the barrow crossing over the Luton line when at the sametime as a DMU was 'setting back' into the Luton line platform no.1.

FORTUNATELY the driver or someone was 'on the ball' and immediately sounded the DMUs horn!!. IMMEDIATELY i stopped dead in my tracks rather then being DEAD ON THE TRACK about 5 yards away from a moving DMU!.

[Mickey]

Fortunately, those sort of things are a rare nowadays, I don't think yellow vests have been particularly instrumental, but better training, monitoring of safety critical staff and improvements in safety equipment such as TPWS have played a greater part.

Yeah funny that you should say that Hermit, there was someone from either RAILTRACK or NETWORK RAIL (whatever they call themselves?) about 8-10 years ago saying-

"We don't know what else we can do to prevent driver's passing a signal a DANGER? (or SPAD to those in the know?) we've provided clear sighted colour light signals, AWS equipment for these signals (AUTOMATIC WARNING SYSTEM) and TPWS equipment (TRAIN PROTECTION & WARNING SYSTEM) as well and still some driver's SPAD signals?. What else we can do is i just don't know??".

Plus also most 'train companies' nowadays operate a policy of 3 (possibly even 2?) SPADs and your off the footplate and off down the road with your P.45!!.

[manna]

G'Day Gents

I could never understand, why I should wear a High Vis Vest in the 'CAB' would it stop a bridge or rock hitting me !! and if I was on a single line and had to use the phone, would it remind my driver 'Not' to run me over, my high vis vest, is still in a box in the shed .......somewhere

manna

[Mickey]

G'Day Gents

I could never understand, why I should wear a High Vis Vest in the 'CAB' would it stop a bridge or rock hitting me !! and if I was on a single line and had to use the phone, would it remind my driver 'Not' to run me over, my high vis vest, is still in a box in the shed .......somewhere

manna

Funny you should mmention this manna i didn't know that it was 'mandatory' for driver's to wear there orange H.V. jackets in the cab of a locomotive while driving?.

I first started to notice this practice of (some) driver's wearing there H.V. jackets in the cabs of locos and DMUs/EMUs maybe back in the late 1980s or early 1990s?. It always struck me as a bit 'odd' incase an approaching train driver driving a train on an opposite line would mistakenly think that seeing a BRIGHT ORANGE colour in the cab of the on coming train would think that the driver was displaying a 'hand danger' signal to them?. A bit confusing??.

The same reasoning use to apply to signalmen in s/boxes wearing maybe a red or red'ish shirt or jumper working a s/box.