Events
The crash occurred at approximately 06:13 (GMT), when a Land Rover Defender towing a loaded trailer (carrying a Renault Savanna estate car) swerved off the M62 motorway just before a bridge over the East Coast Main Line. The vehicle ran down an embankment and onto the southbound railway track. The Land Rover's driver, Gary Neil Hart, tried to reverse it off the track, but he could not. While he was using a mobile telephone to call the emergency services after exiting the vehicle, the Land Rover was hit by a southbound GNER InterCity 225 heading from Newcastle to London King's Cross at over 120 miles per hour (190 km/h).
The InterCity 225 was propelled by a Class 91 locomotive (No.91023) and led by a Driving Van Trailer (DVT). After striking the Land Rover, the leading bogie of the DVT derailed but the train stayed upright. However, points to nearby sidings deflected it into the path of an oncoming Freightliner freight train carrying coal and travelling from Immingham to Ferrybridge hauled by a Class 66 locomotive (No.66521). The freight train hit the wreckage approximately half a mile (642 metres) from the passenger train's impact with the Land Rover. The impact resulted in the near destruction of the lightweight DVT and severe to moderate damage to all nine of the InterCity 225's coaches, which mostly overturned and came to rest down an embankment to the east side of the track, in the gardens of local residents. The trailing locomotive remained upright and suffered minor damage, although it was derailed. The Class 66 freight locomotive overturned onto its left side, sustaining major damage to its cab area and right side, and the first nine wagons were derailed and damaged to varying extents.
Immediately before the impact of the two trains, the speed of the InterCity 225 was estimated as 88 mph (142 km/h) and that of the freight train as 54 mph (87 km/h). With an estimated closing speed of 142 mph (229 km/h), the collision between the trains is the highest speed railway incident that has occurred in the UK.
Read more about this topic: Great Heck Rail Crash
Famous quotes containing the word events:
“One cannot be a good historian of the outward, visible world without giving some thought to the hidden, private life of ordinary people; and on the other hand one cannot be a good historian of this inner life without taking into account outward events where these are relevant. They are two orders of fact which reflect each other, which are always linked and which sometimes provoke each other.”
—Victor Hugo (1802–1885)
“On the most profitable lie, the course of events presently lays a destructive tax; whilst frankness invites frankness, puts the parties on a convenient footing, and makes their business a friendship.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“By many a legendary tale of violence and wrong, as well as by events which have passed before their eyes, these people have been taught to look upon white men with abhorrence.... I can sympathize with the spirit which prompts the Typee warrior to guard all the passes to his valley with the point of his levelled spear, and, standing upon the beach, with his back turned upon his green home, to hold at bay the intruding European.”
—Herman Melville (1819–1891)