Hello,

I had hoped to pester no-one here with "crash items first" again, but I'd like to know details about the "Taunton Sleeping-car fire" which IIRC did occur in the late 70ies or early '80ies when a Mk. II sleeping car caught fire on a Penzance express train, near Taunton. The tragedy seems to have been passed unheard of by continental railways, as the recent incident near Nancy (F) has shown.

DB AG claims that this is the first such incident in European rail history.

Maybe they will merely blame it on the inattentive attendant, but the major problem seems to rest elsewhere. Scandinavian sleepers do not have attendants, but smoke detectors and alarms, whilst the Swiss Railways have decided to go ahead with such devices, yet retain the "attendant".

Any ideas what consequences the Taunton fire has had in terms of safety devices ?

Kind regards, CTW, DE-Goslar

Claus Thomas
Regarding your asking about the Taunton fire. The sleeping car stock at the time was based on the Mk1 coaches from the 1950's. I do not know the cause of the fire but I believe that the fire was spread through the forced ventillation system. To add to the problems, it was found that many doors were locked and passengers could not escape. This was because of low manning levels in the sleeping cars, ie 1 attendant serving 2 or more cars, and problems with non sleeping car passengers gaining access to the cars. There may have been previous cases of vandalism which also caused this action.
As a result, the Mk1 stock was withdrawn and new stock based on the Mk3 was commissionned.I have an idea that the sleeping car service may have been withdrawn until the Mk3 were available. No sooner than these were brought into service, than the sleeing car service suffered a downturn. Some cars were leased to DSB and repainted in the dark blue Moon and Stars livery. They looked minute in a rake of DSB standard stock in Copenhagen station. These have been returned to UK and many are redundant finding their way on to preservation
railways as sleeping accomodation for staff. There was some talk of their being converted to conventional coaches but again I am not sure if that ever took place.
Re the UK sleeping car service, I am not sure of how many operate if any. There was controvesy over withdrawal of the Inverness sleeper. I am not sure if that went ahead. Air travel, especially the cheap airlines, has somewhat taken the need for overnight sleepers in the UK.
Hope that helps
Paul Kidger

AFAIK The fire was caused by spare blankets coming in contact with the heaters, most of the casualties came from smoke inhalation, the doors were locked by the attendants as you say. The service still runs but I think now terminates at Waterloo for Eurostar passengers instead of Paddington.
Tony

I believe (From one of Stanley Hall's books, I think "Danger on the Line") that the fire was definitely blankets left on the heater. All the deaths were due to smoke inhalation; all the dead were found still in bed in their cabins. Everyone that actually woke up managed to escape - the locked doors (which caused a lot of controversy at the time) wasn't a factor in any of the deaths.

The train did run to Waterloo for a time, but has since reverted to Paddington. It still runs, the last surviving locomotive-hauled working into the west country.

IIRC, the fire occurred when the replacement Mk3 sleepers were on the drawing board - they made a number of alterations to the Mk3 design following the fire, which increased the cost of the vehicles to the extend that fewer coaches were ordered.

Tim
Thanks for that reply. I was going from recollection hence the slight errors. I didnt realise that the locked doors was a non-contributory although much reported factor. Was I right over the role played by the ventillation system in spreading the fire and/or smoke. Again it is recollection only.
On the subject of sleeper services, how many are left now? Any news on the fate of the redundant Mk3 sleepers and the mooted conversion to day coaches? With the return of the DSB leased vehicles, there must be quite a few around. I know that some were disposed of to preservation groups and it seems strange to see something as new as a Mk3 parked in Sherringham for staff accomodation.

Paul Kidger

The following sleepers still run

* Paddington-Penzance

* Euston-Edinburgh/Glasgow (splits, AFAIK at Carstairs)

* Euston-Aberdeen/Inverness/Fort William (splits into three portions at Edinburgh)

There were quite a few others up to about ten years ago, including a cross-country one from Glasgow to Plymouth, and some internal Scottish ones between Edinburgh/Glasgow and Inverness. The surviving Anglo-Scottish workings were consolidated into two around the same time.

The project to convert redundant sleeping cars to day coaches turned out not to be feasible; GNER have since taken on a lot of ex-Virgin Mk3 day coaches.

Tim
Thanks for that info on the sleepers. It doesnt surprise me about the conversion being a non starter. I guess that the strength of the Mk 3 is largely in the bodyshell and changing a sleeper to a day coach would appear to be very difficult if the strength is not to be compromised. In days gone by, I have used sleepers from Brm and Euston for Scotland.
Regarding cascading Mk 3 to GNER, the Virgin order must have quite some effect on the stock situation releasing not only Mk3 but also the motive power. Here in Anglia, there is already one 90 on the Norwich to London services with more planned. Initially it is a Railfreight unit but I guess as more become available off the WCML, we shall see more to displace the 86 and I guess reduce the high access charges these units attract.

Paul Kidger

The Mk3s released by Virgin so far are HST trailers displaced by Voyagers from cross-country services. Some complete sets have gone to Midland Main Line, and a lot of trailers to GNER to extend their sets to 9+2. VXC's remaining HSTs are reduced to 5+2 to keep up with Voyager timings, which is why there are a lot of spare trailers.

The loco-hauled sets (with the 87s and 90s) are still in WCML service, and won't be displaced for a year or so, when the Pendelinos are all running. I expect the 90s and 87s be cascaded to other operators (Anglia, Freightliner and EWS) currently using 86s.

Wouldn't be surprised in Anglia took some Mk3s as well.

Modern Railways have speculated that some of the Mk3 sets with DVTs might be used as diesel-hauled push-pull sets to work with 67s (the likely reduction in post office work over the next couple of years will mean these nearly new locos will be looking for new work)

Tim
Thanks for the information
Anglia have only just refurbished their Mk2e stock and in fact there are one or maybe 2 rakes still in the Intercity brand image so it may be some time before they consider replacement. However if the Mk 3 become available then I guess that it would be too good to turn down.
We already have Mk3 restaurant/Buffet cars on the line. It is about time that the 86 were retired, with their axle hung motors they must knock the daylights out of the track, and they are nearly 40 yrs old. Interesting speculation regarding the Mk3+DVT+67. I remember when the ECML electrification meant that there were HST going spare and all sorts of speculation regarding running half sets with a DVT.

Paul Kidger

>>IIRC, the fire occurred when the replacement Mk3 sleepers were on the drawing board - they made a number of alterations to the Mk3 design following the fire, which increased the cost of the vehicles to the extent that fewer coaches were ordered.<<

Thank you all very much for caring - what I had in mind was something like the smoke detectors currently in use on scandinavian sleepers.

Were the MkIII-sleepers modified to be fitted with such alarm devices ? The problem with the forced ventilation & aircon system spreading the fumes was completely new to me. Seems we've got to check if the German "WLab" sleepers also feature through-running air ducts.

As Denmark might have drawn equal with Sweden in terms of safety regulations: Did the return of the British sleepers have any reason in their non-fitting with smoke detectors ? Wild speculation, I know, but this might be a cause behind the "cause" ?

Blanket on heater sounds all too easy, yet pragmatic. I won't thow the first stone, having ignited lots of clothes already when trying to iron them )

Kind regards, CTW

Claus Thomas
I do not know for sure the reason for the termination of the lease on the Mk3 to DSB. It was a lease and not a sale, so their return to the UK was inevitable. I have an idea that the need for DSB sleeper services was reduced because of the various bridges linking the various parts of Denmark, which have recently been built, hence acceleration of the DSB inter city services. Before that, transfer onto a ferry was a feature of some of these DSB services. I am not sure but maybe the Mk3 made it onto DB lines to Hamburg for example.

I would imagine that the Mk3 sleepers were fitted with smoke detectors from the start of their lives, especially since this was such a crucial fact in the Taunton accident. Reliable smoke detectors have been available for about 20 years and of course are a feature of any building especially hotels where people sleep and sometimes smoke. Again, I dont know for sure, but the major redesign of the Mk3 sleeper was probably due to changes needed to the ventillation system and probably the fire resistant construction as a result of the Taunton enquiry.

As I mentionned before, the difference in profile of the Mk3 and other DSB stock was very apparent. I was in Copenhagen station late one night and on the adjoining platform was a sleeper train. The difference in height seemed to be about 300mm, but I am sure someone will correct me on the differences in loading gauges.

Paul Kidger

LAST EDITED ON 16-Nov-02 AT 02:50 AM (MST)
 
Paul, thank you very much;
Continental sleepers are sometimes built with a higher roof extending to 4300 mm (Italy-permitted, not France at 4260 mm). Due to their length, the continental vehicles might be even narrower than the MkIII carbody. The MkIII is described to have a roof height of 3810 mm over roof corrugations acc. to my HST descriptions, which is not too much of a difference. With the class 66 locos featuring a height of 3900 mm over rooftop, I wonder if the sleepers had also been built 150 mm higher than the ordinary coaching / catering versions.

Now an "Ooops - big sorry" of mine; I had buried that in a large cardbox concealed in the basement after the last move, so I've got to enter the following quotation, knowing I will hear stones peltering on my skull ... :

Source: "Modern Railways" Apr.1980, p.146":

>>*Taunton sleeping-car fire report*
>>In his report (HMSO, GBP 2.50 - ISBN 0 11 550513 1) on the fire in the sleeping-car train at Taunton on 6 July 1978, in which 12 passengers died, the inspecting officer, Maj A.G.B.King, concludes that the fire was caused by the overheating of bags of linen placed over an electric heater in the leading vestibule in Coach 'B'. The carriage of linen in vestibules had been authorised by local management, but before the sleepers on the West of England service had been converted to electric train heating. Commenting on the fact that most of the external doors on the burnt-out vehicle were locked, the report states that, while there is no evidence this led directly to the loss of life, it did hamper the evacuation of passengers and fire fighting. Other instructions had also been disregarded and Maj King considers that the training, supervision and control of Western Region sleeping-car attendants was inadequate. In addition, the attendant in charge of the Plymouth portion of the train was not as alert as he should have been and might have been asleep.

>>On the "Mk I" vehicles themselves, the report points out that there are no arrangements for fire detection nor any means of alerting passengers. Neither were there fire instructions for passengers or clearly-marked fire exits. However, the materials used in the vehicles are considered adequate allowing for age and difficulty of replacement. The report says that more could be done in training and practising all passenger-train staff for emergencies they may meet so that effective action can be taken before emergency services arrive if a train stops in an isolated area. Good communications from the train in an emergency are also vital.

>>Commenting on the recommendations in the report BR said that many have already been implemented and modifications to meet others, such as the installation of smoke detectors in "MkI" vehicles, will be carried out as soon as satisfactory and reliable equipment has been developed which complies fully with the recommendations. The design work on the new "Mk III" sleeping cars, frozen after the Taunton fire, is now being progressed in the light of the report's findings. Further improvements to these vehicles still being researched, include windows which can be ejected completely in an emergency."<<

Further finding in the pile of glossy paper (yeah, cl.58 was still on the drawing boards then ...) :

"Modern Railways" Iss.February, 1980, pp 85 ff has a photograph of the first two coaches trailing loco 47 498; apparently the second coach ("B") had suffered worst; the context is the overall safety report on railways operation in 1978, with the numbers of on-board fires having increased form 153 in 1977 to 166 in 1978. A gas explosion from a sleeping-car attendant's tea kettle in Aberdeen that year could not be blamed on the railways directly.

Maybe it is merely chance and pure coincidence: As the 2002 Nancy fire has also involved one of the leading cars behind the loco: Could it be that the voltage drop of ETH due to insufficient return conductors (jointed rails ? Axlebox journals or springs with rubber inserts, but broken earth connectors ?) might have caused overvoltages in the front of the train enhancing the risk of ETH overheating, or at least, running heating devices at their maximum thermal loads, maybe only in order to compensate for voltage drop and keep the rear coaches warm ? Any suggestion here ?

Kind regards, CTW

Claus Thomas
Thanks for that full reply. I am afraid that my copies of Modern Railways were thrown out years ago but it is interesting to see your quotations from the official enquiry. Electric heaters which overheat as a result of being covered, must be a very common occurrance. Some people believe that putting a notice to the effect 'Do not place anything on this heater' offers adequate protection. (I find this in industrial safety matters and I find it totally unacceptable).

I am most surprised that the heaters were not fitted with adequate thermal cut-outs to give protection against this failure, or maybe they didn't work. I suppose that the problem is one of the actual heating element working at a high temperature in order to get the heat into the cabins. When the heater is covered, the temperature soon reaches a temperature when ignition of blankets, linen paper, or whatever, is possible. It probably needs only about 200 degC.
An interesting theory of the voltage drop through the ETH system. Maybe heaters in other coaches were also covered but because of the voltage drop, didnt reach ignition temperature.

I dont want to be an 'armchair expert' but maybe what ought to be fitted are a low temperature heating panels which operate at a temperature too low to cause ignition. Some 'warehouse' type stores fit these in the checkout operators enclosure to provide comfort heating. They operate at about 60 degC. No doubt the alternative is the distributed warm air as one would find in an office block.

Since the Nancy incident involved DB stock, who is conducting the enquiry and when is it likely to take place?

Paul kidger

> Since the Nancy incident involved DB stock, who is conducting the enquiry and when is it likely to take place? <

It should be French Authorities, but apparently, neither side knows. The French state attorney seems to rely on technical expertise supplied by either SNCF or German DB sources, however, had this incident occurred on German metals, the German FRA ("EBA") would have to conduct enquiries; I currently understand that France has no such separate authority working independently of SNCF. This Paris-Vienna "Sleeper Express D261" is likely to be withdrawn by mutual consent of DB AG and SNCF, and I fear the incident (not its consequences) may be sorts of "welcome" politically, limiting the scope of new findings of any enquiry, similar to the Eschede desaster.

> I suppose that the problem is one of the actual heating element working at a high temperature in order to get the heat into the cabins. When the heater is covered, the temperature soon reaches a temperature when ignition of blankets, linen paper, or whatever, is possible. It probably needs only about 200 degC. <

Absolutely agreed.

OK, the "armchair expertism" hint is understood. I do not have a diagram of the heating circuits here.

Anyway, habits might have been to rely on that overheating protection device, which, in case of 50 cps ac heater supplies, is a simple, relatively tardily-responding, "bi-metallic" device. I just tested with my own hot-air-blowers (the hair-dryer one and the room-heater alike!) that you can exceed the nominal filament temperatures vastly by blocking the air flow, before the device cuts out the circuit. This normally doesn't damage the entire item. You just wait 10 minutes, and it works fine again.

However, provided the "habits system" had relied on that overtemperature not to ignite anything, too, and just went foul when the second coach at Taunton and the first coach at Nancy got a few more volts extra, they overheated a bit higher before switching off automatically, repeating this a few times before the linen went smouldering off ... Seems we've got to take into account a number of nasty coincidences, the illegal habit of drying packs of linen on the "electrical fire" ranking top, of course, but the electricals ranking second ...

Now, is that HEP source ac at all ? I think in the UK it may now be, but in case the system is "multimodal" (UK electrical supplies in a way do reflect the Continental mad-mix of supply voltages), then there might have been options to heat the cars with dc, and this definitely rules out any bimetallic protection switches, as these would enhance a fire risk by drawing an arc. You can be pretty sure I had also tested this on a very old 1950ies hot air hair dryer on my parents' stone balcony, supplying it with 315 volts dc instead of 220 V ac, with the excpected "volcanoe" soon erupting (just for the fun of it, smashed the main fuse, the whole blower blowing liquid metal for the very last time, but not my rectifier - Oh, yes, the mains cable is still alive & well here).

OK, with that sleeper train at Taunton in tow of cl.47 498, one might assume the HEP source having been dc, either (cl.47 is the very last diesel- electric not to use any alternators aboard, IIRC). With the arcing problem known, the protection must have been different from what we consider "normality" in our ac- dominated world. If any had been fitted ... In Nancy, the ac 25 kV 50 Hz loco "BB15000" (or 22500) is likely to have supplied ac HEP. However, these coaches do have to accept all sorts of supplies, and will also be heated in Belgium (dc supplies) on the Oostende - Bruxelles - Aachen workings, or on former Dutch sleeper train services (NS will cease all night workings by 15 December, btw), or on the Czech, Italian, Polish Railways' 3 kV dc system, French and Dutch 1.5 kV dc systems ... so it is likely there is no classical overheating protection of the known type at all. Any ideas ?

You can't expect anyone to switch off the bimetallic protectors each time the filaments are going to swallow from dc supply, which on their own will not mind, unless fusing, when they will react quite brutally, also drawing an arc over the interrupt gap until this is wide enough. This might even go along unnoticed by short- circuit protection devices (the net current remains the same or might even drop a bit), unless the device is arcing to "ground". If not, you've got a "volcano" furnace quite soon.

OK, but all this IS known for ages now, and surely by those building or maintaining these Sleeper Cars.

Wonder what we will hear about it, if they even officially start to deny the Taunton incident ... "First time this happened in Europe" (DB AG and "Grandpa Stolpe", the pensionist finding himself in the role of Transport minister after the Federal elections ...).

Regards, CTW

Claus Thomas
A very full reply as always. I would imagine that the Taunton incident was with DC ETH. I feel sure that the arcing properties of DC would have been realised and the cutout operated a proper circuit breaker. However, it would not be a total surprise if this had been overlooked.
I think we have identified the most likely cause, namely a covered heater which ignited either the covering material or some of the rubbish which inevitably collects in such out-of-the-way parts of a railway carriage interior. Maybe the voltage drop has meant that it has been the first coach to be affected.

Paul Kidger

> A very full reply as always. <

Ooops - sorry. Thanks for your kind reply. I nonetheless think, as you seem to raise the correct point here, that I owe you all the update taken from the press (FAZ, Lok-Report, Drehscheibe-online, and others), to prevent any speculation:

French investigation experts have found out about the Nancy sleeping-car fire that an electrical hotplate in the attendant's compartment had been getting overheated and had started nearby- stuffed clothing to smoulder and quickly catch fire. Attendant fled in horror seeking help from his colleague in the next coach. Rest reads quite similar to HMRI's findings 1978 - 80, as quoted above. Except that many of the dead had been found in the gangway, where they apparently suffocated and died.

> covering material or some of the rubbish which inevitably collects in such out-of-the-way parts of a railway carriage interior <

Yes - And maybe after one more substation feeder was passed, the voltage rose sufficiently high to raise heating & irradiation power, either. You often even on ac lines encounter the more vivid performance of motive power near feeder points or substations, and there is no reason why this should not directly be forwarded by the static transformer ratio to the HEP circuits. Plus the first-coach overvoltage ... ok, but European railways do not work sleeping car services over jointed track anymore, which is the main cause of voltage drops towards the rear of the train. Except faulty earth brushes in the axleboxes, for sure.

Kind regards, CTW

Re the UK sleeping car service, I am not sure of how many operate if any. There was controvesy over withdrawal of the Inverness sleeper. I am not sure if that went ahead. Air travel, especially the cheap airlines, has somewhat taken the need for overnight sleepers in the UK.
Hope that helps
Paul Kidger

There are two remaining sleeper services. One runs from Euston to Scotland, with sections for Inverness, Fort William and, I think Aberdeen.

The other runs from Paddington to Penzance.

All others have been abandoned. I used the former train from Glasgow-Edinburgh to Inverness once. Also a train from Edinburgh to Bristol. I wish I had used the sleeper from poole to Scotland.
George Matthews