Two Trains Drop Containers onto Open Tracks during High Wind

During the night of last Friday (29th Feb), the UK suffered some high winds.

Overnight in two separate incidents, trains conveying Containers located on spigots, lost some Containers. These appear to have been physically lifted off the wagon and blown, or fell, onto the track.

In neither case was any Driver ware of anything amiss.

The two incidents, which happened a couple of hundred miles apart but on the West Coast Main Line between London (Euston) and Glasgow (Central) were discovered when in one case, a train was sent to examine the track for a suspected OHL fault when power had been lost, and in the other a train was sent to examine the line after signalling equipment failed.

Both trains came across Containders lying on the track.

All in all a VERY lucky escape.

Here are some links.

The BBC website story.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/7272373.stm

Here is a link to some photos of the first incident at Ledburn Jct, which is where the Great Train Robbery took place.
http://jcp.fotopic.net/p48721601.html

Here are photos from the other site at Shap.
http://www.burgess57.freeserve.co.uk/latest.htm

UKrailwayman wrote:trains conveying Containers located on spigots

Spigots?
Does this mean container interlocks/interbox containers, or refer to container flats wagons, or what?
Is this term UK specific only, or pan-European?

We just call them iso interlocks . i'm not aware of this happening in nz , where we have strong winds . I do remember a container shifting because it hadnt been locked down properly , and taking out amajor bridge . also fo containers stacked 4 high been blown over . but this was in 100 mph plus winds . Perhaps the "spigots" were worn or faulty ???

We have rotating spigots called Twistlocks, whereby the spigot locks down the container onto the wagon frame.

We now use the continetal system where the container just sits within the spigots on the wagon. It is free to be lifted on and off and is not locked in anyway.

The weight of the container is meant to such that this is all that is necessary to retain the containers on the spigots. At least that was popular opinion until Saturday morning.

How are double stacked containers secured to one-another ?

ive always wondered about ships with vcontainers stacks 4 - 6 high . so they have a man on a ladder doing twistlocks ???
i think they just sit there . they do lose a few at sea .

David Benton wrote:ive always wondered about ships with vcontainers stacks 4 - 6 high . so they have a man on a ladder doing twistlocks ???
i think they just sit there . they do lose a few at sea .

No according to a guy who worked ships, there are special back to back twistlocks that are used to lock the container stacks together.

Thanks for that .
The spigot idea is probably fine in most circumstances . a contianer is roughly as wide as it is high , so is quite a stable thing .
But i guess add the combo of a wind gust , rail cant , and possibly a bit of rough track , and i guess it could jump off .

Well, if the Central Railway (Site here) is built (is that even remotely possible?), and starts hauling double stacks, your gonna need to use interbox connection - double stacked containers present a nice big sail surface to crosswinds.

i can see the central railway going ahead in some form , but i can't see double stacks happening . just not suitable for the speeds required to be competitive in Europe . arerodynamics are bad , creating too much drag .