Total number of deaths 4 | Date 15 February 2004 Injuries 5 | |
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Similar Cairns Tilt Train derailment, Ufton Nervet rail crash, Hatfield rail crash, Ryongchon disaster, 2004 Sri Lanka tsunami tr | ||
The Tebay rail accident occurred when four railway workers working on the West Coast Main Line were killed by a runaway wagon near Tebay, Cumbria, England in the early hours of 15 February 2004.
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Incident
The accident happened after a wagon laden with lengths of steel rail ran away from a maintenance area at Scout Green because it did not have properly working brakes. Wooden chocks had been placed in front of the wagon to stop it moving because the hydraulic brakes had been disconnected due to a fault; however they had not been repaired or replaced. As a maintenance worker began using an excavator's "log grab" in an attempt to drag sections of scrap rail from the wagon, the action caused the wooden blocks to dislodge. Slowly the wagon began to move downhill gathering momentum on the 1 in 75 gradient from Shap summit.
In darkness, the 16-tonne steel wagon rolled down the West Coast Main Line reaching speeds of up to 40 miles per hour (60 km/h). Running almost silently and without any warnings, it struck the four railway workers (Colin Buckley, 49, Carnforth; Darren Burgess, 30, Carnforth; Chris Waters, 53, Morecambe; Gary Tindall, 46, Tebay) who were carrying out overnight work 3.25 miles (5 km) further down the main line. Five men were also injured. The wagon continued to travel for almost 4 miles (6 km) until stopping.
Aftermath
Following the incident, Mark Connolly the boss of the rail maintenance company, MAC Machinery Services, as well as the crane operator, Roy Kennett, were tried at Newcastle Crown Court on charges of manslaughter caused by gross negligence. Connolly was also prosecuted for breaches of health and safety law. Both men were found guilty by majority verdicts; Connolly was sentenced to nine years and Kennett for two years.
On 1 March 2007, an appeal launched by the two jailed men seeking to overturn their convictions failed. However the Court of Appeal did reduce Connolly's prison sentence from nine to seven years. In January 2017, the Office of the Traffic Commissioner for Wales announced it had rejected an application by Connolly for a Heavy Goods Vehicle Operators' License because of his manslaughter convictions. He had made the application to operate HGVs after being found driving a lorry without such a licence in May 2016.
There is a small plaque at the site of the Tebay incident, with the names of the deceased, which was erected in September 2006.