Ministry of Transport Report on the Derailment
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Ministry of Transport report on the derailment at Blea Moor, published 1952.
The cause of the accident:
“There is no doubt about the cause of this accident. The front end of a brake rod on the tender of the leading engine became detached and, after bouncing on the sleepers and ballast between the rails for a distance of over two miles, it struck the stretcher bar of the first facing points. The closed switch of the points was wrenched open and the derailment of the second engine and the following coaches was inevitable.”
The maintenance of the braking system was criticised:
“The brake rod came adrift because of bad maintenance of the engine. The round pin holding the rod to the brake shaft became displaced, and this can only have resulted from the securing split pin having dropped out of position. The split pin was not found and it may have come out many miles back. It is not possible, therefore, to say in what way it was defective. There can be no doubt however, that there was some defect, for a well fitting split pin with correctly splayed legs will not fall out of its own accord. The wear marks on the round pin concerned indicated that the split pin could not have been a good fit, and that its condition was like that of the equivalent pin on the other brake rod, which was far from good. It seems probable, therefore, that one leg of the missing pin sheared, and that the pin fell out because the other leg was straight or inadequately splayed. On the other hand both the legs may have sheared.”
Creator
Department of Transport
Contributor
Nancy Edmondson
Reference number
NAN/003/001
Storage location
Edmondson family
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