The Gare de Lyon Disaster

Here are a few notes of interest from this story that didn’t find a place in the main video.

Passenger emergency brakes

Since the time of this accident, passenger emergency brakes on trains have changed a lot. Now it’s relatively rare that a passenger pulling an emergency brake lever will result instantly in an automatic brake application.

Instead, pulling one of these levers usually alerts the driver, who can hold off the brake application until the train is in a safe place to stop. Some systems will also show the driver a CCTV image of the area where the handle was pulled, and allow them to speak to the passenger who pulled it.

As for when they should be used – the two most common situations where using the emergency brake would be a good idea are: someone is caught in the doors and would be injured if the train moved away; or, a passenger has had a medical emergency while the train is in a station, and needs to be helped off before the train pulls away.

The other train guard

In the video I mention that the delayed train was almost ready to move away just before the accident. It’s possible that, if it had gotten moving soon enough, it might have avoided a collision with the runaway train.

The reason the delayed train was delayed in the first place? The guard, a man named Andre Fouquet, was late arriving to work. By the time he did arrive, all signals had been set to red because of the general alarm and it was too late to move away.

In the aftermath of the accident Andre Fouquet did face some criticism – although clearly he couldn’t have known that his lateness might contribute to the upcoming accident. He noted that he was delayed as he stopped to direct some passengers – just one of many tiny, momentary decisions that played into this complicated accident.