Carmont recovery
Network Rail removes the stricken vehicles from the scene of August 12‘s fatal HST derailment at Carmont.
NETWORK Rail was lifting the final vehicles from ScotRail’s wrecked High Speed Train at Carmont as this issue of RAIL went to press on September 16.
NR spokesman Kevin Groves explained that the final lift was expected to be the train’s front power car (43140), which has been lying down an embankment since the accident on August 12 ( RAIL 912).
This lift was due to take place on September 17, with the power car to be taken to St Rollox Works, Glasgow, on September 18 to face further examination by the
Rail Accident Investigation Branch (RAIB).
NR began lifting the train on September 10, with the rear power car (43030) first to be hoisted up and onto a low-loader to leave for RAIB’s compound at St Rollox the same day. Groves said Coaches A and B were lifted on September
10, with Coach A leaving that day and Coach B staying on a pad by the crane until September 14 because high winds prevented more lifts.
On September 14, NR placed Coach B onto a low-loader to leave and lifted Coach C to the crane pad. It lifted Coach C to a lowloader and the final coach (Coach D) to the pad on September 15. Coach D was expected to leave site the following day.
With the site clear of the train, Groves said NR expected RAIB and Police Scotland to scour it for any remaining evidence before handing it back to NR for repairs. He added that hand-back might not take place until the weekend of September 19-20.
Before recovery work could start,
NR had to build a temporary road to the site and divert Carron Water into pipes, in order to dump rock into the watercourse to create a pad for its heavy lift crawler crane.
The track owner now faces the task of renewing damaged track, repairing telecommunications equipment, and repairing the
cutting side from which the landslip occurred that derailed the train and left three people dead. It must also build new parapets across Bridge 325. They were demolished in the accident.
Groves said that repairs might take three to four weeks, with the line unlikely to open before the end of October. He added that once the line was open again, NR could concentrate on removing the crane pad, access road and the large pipes currently carrying Carron Water through the site.
Meanwhile, ScotRail started a shuttle service on September 14 between Edinburgh and Montrose.
Nine daily trains will run each way (the first northbound service starts at Dundee), with five on Sundays between Dundee and Montrose.
It follows the introduction on August 31 of an AberdeenStonehaven shuttle. Buses continue to link Dundee and Aberdeen. Carmont lies 21 miles north of