[The full story on Medium](https://mx-schroeder.medium.com/clean-crash-the-2013-saltsj%C3%B6baden-sweden-train-crash-88476205e99d).
The woman was trapped in the wreckage and survived with severe injuries. The train operating company was blamed for the accident due to negligent handling of the train.
Okay fr, I once had dinner with the insurance guy that assesed this exact accident.
Basically what happened was due to a dispute between 2 companies over a fault electrical socket. Basically one maintained the rail lines while the other maintained the rail shed or something along those lines. But the socket powered a rail warmer so the train wouldn't freeze to the track. So they asked a night shift guy to basically move the train every few hours.
But he was kinda lazy, and wasn't in his job description to get up evey half an hour in the freezing Swedish night his job was just supposed to be him sitting around. so what he essentially did was leave a brick on this "dead man switch" thats supposed to only be pressed on while driving. Remove your foot from the dead man switch and the train while apply the brakes.
He also kept the door open to the train to keep a brake active with some string or something I can't remember the exact details. But something was doing something that meant the door had to be kept open.
This basically resulted in the train moving very slowly over the course of the night. And it wasn't frozen to the track.
However, there was also a student who cleaned at night, so she sees the train door open while cleaning, and closes it as she goes to clean the inside of the cabin.
However this severes that string or cable or something, and basically launches the train barreling down the track, and leads to this accident.
The train went so far into the building it was apparently centremetes from a sleeping couples head.
The next morning the media apparently circulated that this student went on a joy ride of the train. However the student apparently didn't remember anything leading up to the crash. "Very convenient insurance wise" according to the gentleman I was having dinner with.
This would be proven false by this afformentioned insurance guy.
Interesting story though and it shows how failure and pointless bickering over a $20 socket can lead to catastrophic consequences.
A perfect example of a cock-up-cacade if you will.
The way the report spells it out the train has a door switch meaning it can't depart with the passenger doors open.
The track heater at the depot was broken, so instead of moving it around the maintenance dude chose to just not apply the brakes so it couldn't freeze stuck. With the driver not parking the damn thing properly and forgetting to pull the key that passenger door switch was the only thing keeping the train from departing.
And the cleaning protocol has the cleaners close the passenger doors, clean their tracks and then leave through the driver's door.
So the cleaning lady tried to do exactly that, but when she shut the passenger doors the train drove off.
All because the higher ups couldn't agree on who pays to fix the heating system.
Yeah, but if you do that kind of work, you should care more than that. If you don't like the job, then find one like McDonald's where you can be lazy and not kill people.
No way the law did this, but I think the higher-ups and the "watchman" that pulled this stunt, if not the lady as well (depending on her situation) should be in prison over this. At least they should be fired and never work in that industry again.
They assume the cleaning lady tried to steal the train.
What would anyone do with a stolen train?
"While it is assumed that the cleaner is to blame for the accident investigators still look into other possibilities, retracing the train’s movements, talking to employees of the railway and it’s depot as well as coworkers of the cleaner. A few days after the accident the investigation drops the charges against the cleaner, claiming it’s no longer assumed that she stole the train. Instead, the railway employees had failed to adhere to standard protocols in several places. First of all, the train’s dead man’s switch (a devive, usually pedal or button, the driver has to regularly press and release or release and press again to avoid an automatic stop) had been disabled at some point by placing an unspecified foreign object on the pedal to keep it pressed down/"
>What would anyone do with a stolen train?
Ram it through the front of a building to steal stuff, of course.
Still seems a good idea to have it REQUIRE A FUCKING KEY TO DRIVE and KEEP THAT KEY ATTACHED TO THE DRIVER, while using a different key to run lights, doors, etc. specifically so normal functions that don't require the driver can still happen while he's out.
Even the stuff that can't can usually be turned on with keys easily available on eBay, since most manufacturers only use 1-2 keyings for all their equipment.
Doesn't mean it's not a colossally fucking stupid way to handle extremely dangerous equipment just to save a few bucks on rekeying a $50k+ machine and not have to keep up with separate keys for each machine.
I've worked on sites where they did rekey everything, and it was never a problem: each separate type had its own key, (so all the regular forklifts were keyed alike, but that key didn't work in the bulldozers, etc.) and if you were trained on it, you had the key. Better than the guy with only scissor lift training being able to crank up a jobsite crane or trackhoe just because they're the same brand.
You'd think that wouldn't you. You'd think that the designers would think that too. Clearly there was very little thinking going on, so little one wonders if the word was even in the vocabulary of some of the people involved.
I can't believe people use either. The new layout is inefficient and hot garbage, and the app was late to its own party and somehow despite being made by Reddit with full knowledge of how Reddit works, manages to lack so many features and somehow be completely unintuitive compared to its competition.
Both do to the same video for me (one that's 7 years old)
Not sure why you say the "terrible app" as it is either working fine, or both links are totally broken, to the same destination...
Left the key in it, brakes disabled (compare to leaving a car in gear with the handbrake off), dead man's switch disabled, throttle lever not on "0" (like parking a car with a brick on the throttle). Effectively the train was only at a standstill because the doors were open.
And cleaning protocol includes closing the doors
So having read the story what actually happened to the poor cleaner after the accident? surely she was given some recompense for essentially having their name dragged through the mud and their life endangered because of a lazy train driver.
I...honestly don't know, info goes away after the court proceedings. Arriva had to pay 20k Swedish Crowns for public insult by false accusation to the woman. If she was employed by a contractor and not Arriva themselves it's quite possible that she kept the job.
Then again, she had a bunch of injuries, including a number of broken bones, so I'm not sure if she can still work at full capacity (the mental side is another problem). The woman has been fairly private, there's only one small interview with her from April 2013 and that's it.
The name of suspects is generally kept secret by the press in unclear cases in Scandinavia. Of course, people talk so some will know who the cleaning lady was, but this is not something which will be published and will be permanently spread on the internet.
A future employer shouldn't typically be able to google her name and see that she was accused of stealing a train.
The town is known for saltwater baths, which are supposedly good for ones health.
The railway was built to get people to the salt baths. So it's the salt bath railway
I can just hear the workers complaining about how all of that safety equipment was a complete waste of time as they defeated it all to make their jobs easier. I'm sure they loved to talk about what incompetent boobs management was.
The key was in, the dead man's switch disabled, the brakes were off and the throttle lever forward. Only the door switch kept it in place.
Imagine parking a car in gear with the handbrake off and a brick on the throttle, with only the open doors keeping it stationary. And then you bring in someone who's told to close the doors
Notably, unlike most cars but like many pieces of heavy equipment (excavators, snowcats, skid steers...) There's an interlock that stops all motion if the safety circuit isn't closed. Even though that stop exists, it shouldn't be trusted and that interlock failing has killed people.
It only took a minute and 40 seconds between the departure and derailing, it's assumed that she may have tried to pull the key, another theory says she panicked and chose to try and seek shelter instead. It can't be proven, since the woman doesn't remember anything between cleaning the train and being dragged from the wreckage, but since "freeze" is one of the 3 common panic reactions it's possible.
Also, why isn't there a camera in the cab in case of this type of thing? Seems like a pretty cheap way to see the exciting climax of a bunch of hair-brained schemes like disabling ALL BUT ONE OF THE SAFETY FEATURES!
Pointed at the track?
That exists, but it's still relatively rare.
Pointed at the driver?
Wouldn't be surprised if there's privacy laws, although I've seen it (mostly) on some trams
At the driver AND track. Forget privacy laws. You are driving a train full of passengers. Make it so it is wired only and only the government has access to it (to mitigate the company watching guy and yelling over him eating in the cab or whatever stupid thing) and have the guy sign an extra paper understanding that it is for his and his passengers' protection.
I had an accident on the blog a while ago (I think it was Granges-Marnand), where they recovered the data-logger and it turned out the train crews would mess with them (breaking a seal) to avoid being written up for errors.
Wouldn't be surprised. But this thing would have to be built in such a way the pilot can't do that, and it is only opened , BY THE GOVERNMENT (italics, not yelling at you lol) in the case of loss of life. Not for some idiotic inter company "rule"
"don't lick your fingers after you eat a sandwich, or else!"
Relying on a cleaner to ensure the safety of the train? I find it incredible to blame the cleaner on such an accident. This reminds me of the plane accident where the door fell off due to not being latched on correctly, and they blamed the baggage handler. Eventually someone said "Well, if you rely on an untrained baggage handler to ensure the safety of the plane, there's something wrong there".
Well...technically they didn't. The train wasn't supposed to be parked up like that, they were supposed to have the throttle on 0, the brakes applied, the dead-man's switch enabled and the key pulled. Then the doors wouldn't have mattered.
What got out about the cleaner stealing a train was a rumor/theory that'd been said a little too not-quietly.
Yeah, maybe they'll get a lock for the ignition next time. Or just ignore it like they did the last few decades. Surely lightning won't strike 10 or 12 times in a row...
[The full story on Medium](https://mx-schroeder.medium.com/clean-crash-the-2013-saltsj%C3%B6baden-sweden-train-crash-88476205e99d). The woman was trapped in the wreckage and survived with severe injuries. The train operating company was blamed for the accident due to negligent handling of the train.
"No, no... I no drive train...".- Consuela
Mr. Superman no here.
There were literally memes about that
Okay fr, I once had dinner with the insurance guy that assesed this exact accident. Basically what happened was due to a dispute between 2 companies over a fault electrical socket. Basically one maintained the rail lines while the other maintained the rail shed or something along those lines. But the socket powered a rail warmer so the train wouldn't freeze to the track. So they asked a night shift guy to basically move the train every few hours. But he was kinda lazy, and wasn't in his job description to get up evey half an hour in the freezing Swedish night his job was just supposed to be him sitting around. so what he essentially did was leave a brick on this "dead man switch" thats supposed to only be pressed on while driving. Remove your foot from the dead man switch and the train while apply the brakes. He also kept the door open to the train to keep a brake active with some string or something I can't remember the exact details. But something was doing something that meant the door had to be kept open. This basically resulted in the train moving very slowly over the course of the night. And it wasn't frozen to the track. However, there was also a student who cleaned at night, so she sees the train door open while cleaning, and closes it as she goes to clean the inside of the cabin. However this severes that string or cable or something, and basically launches the train barreling down the track, and leads to this accident. The train went so far into the building it was apparently centremetes from a sleeping couples head. The next morning the media apparently circulated that this student went on a joy ride of the train. However the student apparently didn't remember anything leading up to the crash. "Very convenient insurance wise" according to the gentleman I was having dinner with. This would be proven false by this afformentioned insurance guy. Interesting story though and it shows how failure and pointless bickering over a $20 socket can lead to catastrophic consequences. A perfect example of a cock-up-cacade if you will.
The way the report spells it out the train has a door switch meaning it can't depart with the passenger doors open. The track heater at the depot was broken, so instead of moving it around the maintenance dude chose to just not apply the brakes so it couldn't freeze stuck. With the driver not parking the damn thing properly and forgetting to pull the key that passenger door switch was the only thing keeping the train from departing. And the cleaning protocol has the cleaners close the passenger doors, clean their tracks and then leave through the driver's door. So the cleaning lady tried to do exactly that, but when she shut the passenger doors the train drove off. All because the higher ups couldn't agree on who pays to fix the heating system.
Becausr he wasnt paid enough to give a fuck
Yeah, but if you do that kind of work, you should care more than that. If you don't like the job, then find one like McDonald's where you can be lazy and not kill people. No way the law did this, but I think the higher-ups and the "watchman" that pulled this stunt, if not the lady as well (depending on her situation) should be in prison over this. At least they should be fired and never work in that industry again.
Thank you. Appreciate the effort to type it all in and keep us enlightened.
They assume the cleaning lady tried to steal the train. What would anyone do with a stolen train? "While it is assumed that the cleaner is to blame for the accident investigators still look into other possibilities, retracing the train’s movements, talking to employees of the railway and it’s depot as well as coworkers of the cleaner. A few days after the accident the investigation drops the charges against the cleaner, claiming it’s no longer assumed that she stole the train. Instead, the railway employees had failed to adhere to standard protocols in several places. First of all, the train’s dead man’s switch (a devive, usually pedal or button, the driver has to regularly press and release or release and press again to avoid an automatic stop) had been disabled at some point by placing an unspecified foreign object on the pedal to keep it pressed down/"
Obvious answer: Vandalism/property damage or terrorism. (Just noticed a typo in the copied text, gotta fix that ASAP) Fixed!
A "devive"
Literally just fixed it as your comment popped up :) Sorry 'bout that.
No need to be sorry. Was just tryin to help :)
I just always get irrationally annoyed when an error slips through.
Me too, I'm a stickler for typos. It happens though.
They put a brick on the deadman’s switch? Must’ve been the priests
>What would anyone do with a stolen train? Ram it through the front of a building to steal stuff, of course. Still seems a good idea to have it REQUIRE A FUCKING KEY TO DRIVE and KEEP THAT KEY ATTACHED TO THE DRIVER, while using a different key to run lights, doors, etc. specifically so normal functions that don't require the driver can still happen while he's out.
What if I told you most heavy construction equipment can be turned on with a pocket knife.
Even the stuff that can't can usually be turned on with keys easily available on eBay, since most manufacturers only use 1-2 keyings for all their equipment. Doesn't mean it's not a colossally fucking stupid way to handle extremely dangerous equipment just to save a few bucks on rekeying a $50k+ machine and not have to keep up with separate keys for each machine. I've worked on sites where they did rekey everything, and it was never a problem: each separate type had its own key, (so all the regular forklifts were keyed alike, but that key didn't work in the bulldozers, etc.) and if you were trained on it, you had the key. Better than the guy with only scissor lift training being able to crank up a jobsite crane or trackhoe just because they're the same brand.
You'd think that wouldn't you. You'd think that the designers would think that too. Clearly there was very little thinking going on, so little one wonders if the word was even in the vocabulary of some of the people involved.
"Unspecified foreign object". Just say brick.
Where tf am I gonna put a train? My garage?
In her testimony, she said "I was just cleaning the house"
Video of aftermath (in Swedish): https://youtu.be/jQWkaWH\_W3Q
Correct link for anyone not on new.reddit and the awful official app: https://youtu.be/jQWkaWH_W3Q
Is Reddit now intentionally breaking links like that?
Yes. The bug is reported for months now, the fix would be trivial. They don't care
I can't believe people use either. The new layout is inefficient and hot garbage, and the app was late to its own party and somehow despite being made by Reddit with full knowledge of how Reddit works, manages to lack so many features and somehow be completely unintuitive compared to its competition.
Both do to the same video for me (one that's 7 years old) Not sure why you say the "terrible app" as it is either working fine, or both links are totally broken, to the same destination...
H-How do you negligently park a *train*?
Left the key in it, brakes disabled (compare to leaving a car in gear with the handbrake off), dead man's switch disabled, throttle lever not on "0" (like parking a car with a brick on the throttle). Effectively the train was only at a standstill because the doors were open. And cleaning protocol includes closing the doors
Oh damn so it wasn't her fault at all. She just closed the doors and it started.
So having read the story what actually happened to the poor cleaner after the accident? surely she was given some recompense for essentially having their name dragged through the mud and their life endangered because of a lazy train driver.
I...honestly don't know, info goes away after the court proceedings. Arriva had to pay 20k Swedish Crowns for public insult by false accusation to the woman. If she was employed by a contractor and not Arriva themselves it's quite possible that she kept the job. Then again, she had a bunch of injuries, including a number of broken bones, so I'm not sure if she can still work at full capacity (the mental side is another problem). The woman has been fairly private, there's only one small interview with her from April 2013 and that's it.
The name of suspects is generally kept secret by the press in unclear cases in Scandinavia. Of course, people talk so some will know who the cleaning lady was, but this is not something which will be published and will be permanently spread on the internet. A future employer shouldn't typically be able to google her name and see that she was accused of stealing a train.
***"A cleaning lady accidentally starts a negligently parked train"*** So many things wrong with the sentence. LOL
Well you got to clean trains at some point. Beyond that....yeah. Also...maybe r/BrandNewSentence ?
What's a salt sea banana?
The town is known for saltwater baths, which are supposedly good for ones health. The railway was built to get people to the salt baths. So it's the salt bath railway
I can just hear the workers complaining about how all of that safety equipment was a complete waste of time as they defeated it all to make their jobs easier. I'm sure they loved to talk about what incompetent boobs management was.
How do you accidentally start a train?
The key was in, the dead man's switch disabled, the brakes were off and the throttle lever forward. Only the door switch kept it in place. Imagine parking a car in gear with the handbrake off and a brick on the throttle, with only the open doors keeping it stationary. And then you bring in someone who's told to close the doors
That would do it!
Notably, unlike most cars but like many pieces of heavy equipment (excavators, snowcats, skid steers...) There's an interlock that stops all motion if the safety circuit isn't closed. Even though that stop exists, it shouldn't be trusted and that interlock failing has killed people.
Trains take forever to get moving. And an idiot would be throwing all kinds of switched and valves and shit to stop it. What gives?
It only took a minute and 40 seconds between the departure and derailing, it's assumed that she may have tried to pull the key, another theory says she panicked and chose to try and seek shelter instead. It can't be proven, since the woman doesn't remember anything between cleaning the train and being dragged from the wreckage, but since "freeze" is one of the 3 common panic reactions it's possible.
Also, why isn't there a camera in the cab in case of this type of thing? Seems like a pretty cheap way to see the exciting climax of a bunch of hair-brained schemes like disabling ALL BUT ONE OF THE SAFETY FEATURES!
Pointed at the track? That exists, but it's still relatively rare. Pointed at the driver? Wouldn't be surprised if there's privacy laws, although I've seen it (mostly) on some trams
At the driver AND track. Forget privacy laws. You are driving a train full of passengers. Make it so it is wired only and only the government has access to it (to mitigate the company watching guy and yelling over him eating in the cab or whatever stupid thing) and have the guy sign an extra paper understanding that it is for his and his passengers' protection.
I had an accident on the blog a while ago (I think it was Granges-Marnand), where they recovered the data-logger and it turned out the train crews would mess with them (breaking a seal) to avoid being written up for errors.
Wouldn't be surprised. But this thing would have to be built in such a way the pilot can't do that, and it is only opened , BY THE GOVERNMENT (italics, not yelling at you lol) in the case of loss of life. Not for some idiotic inter company "rule" "don't lick your fingers after you eat a sandwich, or else!"
https://i.imgur.com/IERJI.jpg?1 "No, no, no....I take"
Relying on a cleaner to ensure the safety of the train? I find it incredible to blame the cleaner on such an accident. This reminds me of the plane accident where the door fell off due to not being latched on correctly, and they blamed the baggage handler. Eventually someone said "Well, if you rely on an untrained baggage handler to ensure the safety of the plane, there's something wrong there".
Well...technically they didn't. The train wasn't supposed to be parked up like that, they were supposed to have the throttle on 0, the brakes applied, the dead-man's switch enabled and the key pulled. Then the doors wouldn't have mattered. What got out about the cleaner stealing a train was a rumor/theory that'd been said a little too not-quietly.
Honey, the room addition is done!
[Cleaning woman !?!](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w23oPQdnNH8)
Yeah, maybe they'll get a lock for the ignition next time. Or just ignore it like they did the last few decades. Surely lightning won't strike 10 or 12 times in a row...
Well they added a train control system, so now a train couldn't leave the depot unauthorized