Author Topic: Train crash this morning near Brussels (Read 16093 times)

FD · « **on:** February 15, 2010, 11:23 »

Happened a few hours ago near Brussels. Death toll 12-25 (unknown yet) since they just started extracting corpses. It happened close as I'm still in Brussels for a week, but since I don't keep a car any more in Europe, I couldn't reach the spot. I would have had problems anyways with my short 24-75 lens for some good editorial.

slideshow

donding · « **Reply #1 on:** February 15, 2010, 11:46 »

Wow that's sad...do they know what caused it?

madelaide · « **Reply #2 on:** February 15, 2010, 13:18 »

That's horrible, FD. I'm sorry to hear about this.

FD · « **Reply #3 on:** February 15, 2010, 13:59 »

Quote from: donding on February 15, 2010, 11:46

Wow that's sad...do they know what caused it?

One of the conductors blew the red lights.

donding · « **Reply #4 on:** February 15, 2010, 14:08 »

Quote from: FD-amateur on February 15, 2010, 13:59

Quote from: donding on February 15, 2010, 11:46
Wow that's sad...do they know what caused it?
One of the conductors blew the red lights.

What is "blew the red lights" mean?

camera shy · « **Reply #5 on:** February 15, 2010, 14:17 »

I just heard about it a couple of hours ago and thought about you FD....terrible news

FD · « **Reply #6 on:** February 15, 2010, 14:40 »

Quote from: donding on February 15, 2010, 14:08

Quote from: FD-amateur on February 15, 2010, 13:59
Quote from: donding on February 15, 2010, 11:46
Wow that's sad...do they know what caused it?

One of the conductors blew the red lights.
What is "blew the red lights" mean?

Ignored. The idiot thing is they had a similar accident 10 years ago, and they promised to install automatic brakes when a driver/conductor passes red lights. But as the railways are still state-owned/controlled, it probably got lost in a swamp of red tape. There is no excuse since that line has several tracks as the fast train Eurostar to London and Thalys to Paris passes there too. It's all state of the art electric lines.

By coincidence, I shot one of the trains last year in the station:

donding · « **Reply #7 on:** February 15, 2010, 15:09 »

I remember that happening several years ago but wasn't sure where. Wonder if they will do anything about now that it has happened again. I would dare to say those passengers could sue and would probably win.

Albert Martin · « **Reply #8 on:** February 15, 2010, 17:35 »

Very sad to see this!

Well... For trains it is better to have all automated as in Dubai or other places!

RacePhoto · « **Reply #9 on:** February 22, 2010, 23:50 »

Quote from: Albert Martin on February 15, 2010, 17:35

Very sad to see this!

Well... For trains it is better to have all automated as in Dubai or other places!

Sure and then when the computer burps, you have a huge death toll and no one to blame.

People are still the best, but having a backup safety system that alerts first and next takes over automatically if the driver doesn't respond.

They had one in the US and the engineer was texting and not paying attention.