Derailment in the northern Italian region of Lombardy. Article only mentions one injury but has several pics. http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world...hern-italy-one-injured/ar-BB188FwI?ocid=ientp
Hi, no official news yet by the train operator, but looks like the train was not in service yet and got somehow to a dead end track hitting the terminal and smashing over. Fortunately looks like only the crew was aboard and no life threatening injury is present. The carriages were anyway in their last months of operation, about 50 years old...., the operator is cutting them by the dozens. Bad month for that region, a few days ago a car was hit by a train on a grade crossing. Some witnesses said the gates did not close properly and the driver was tricked to go through. Sadly she died on impact.
More news, the train was parked in another station and the crew actually was outside the train when it started to move for unknown reasons (very strange as the line should have the PTC system active). In any case it got all the way to the following station where the dispatcher put it on a siding via CTC to stop it by derailing. The two engineers got also injured while trying to catch the train in motion. There was one passenger onboard in the rear section of the train, he fortunately got lightly injured. Probably he did not realize the train was moving without the crew as he could have pulled the emergency brake and stop the train.
All the main lines have PTC in Italy, but if the train did not get above 30KPH or bust a red signal, it may have not triggered the PTC. 30 KPH Looks consistent with the damage observed. Info on the italian PTC here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sistema_Controllo_Marcia_Treno
I have no idea how Italy has implemented their version of PTC. In the US a locomotive must be electronically connected to PTC by the crew - which is required by the rules. A train COULD be started by persons unknown in PTC territory WITHOUT going through the steps of activating PTC on the train and PTC would have no control of the train as it would also have no knowledge of the train.
Probably more than a PTC the Italian is a system that prevents signal busting and overspeed. And it relies on equipment between rails rail to tell the train what to do; these are close to block boundaries and present at all signals. As long as I know the system activates when the locomotive is active, and can not be deactivated unless on purpose.
Until a few years ago it was really worse. Now it is present less frequently, mostly on regionals (especially the ones that overnight at small stations); for intercity or high speed train, these are kept in enclosed spaces with vigilance, so it is less common and in any case these are cleaned before going back to service. All trains lare coated with a coloured plastic film that makes cleaning easier as paint does not really stick.
Virtually any 'safety device' has the ability to be cut in and cut out of operation. When one is involved in yard operations - be that passenger or freight - the yard tracks do not contain the protections that exist for Main Track operation - with many system, if the safety device is cut in where the track is not configured for its operation in most cases the locomotive won't be allowed to move because of the safety device, therefore it must be cut out. Equipment without the safety device cut in can then operate where where the device is supposed to be operational and not be controlled by the safety device. Safety devices - no matter how good they are - DO FAIL. When a train is operating and the safety device fails, in nearly all cases the device will be cut out and the train will complete its trip and the shop forces at destination will fix the problem before the unit is returned to service.
I got your point, but looking into the italian system, it is not “continuous” that means it gets info and actually can control the train only when the train crosses a sensor, so no sensor, no control. I heard about locos and trains stuck due to a failure of the system and having to be switched fully off to allow another locomotive to pull the train. In any case i am not a technician.
Often they are charged for damages by the train operator (just recently courts started to charge), or go to serve a term on social works. News say that the crew left the train completely disabled (switched off), but did not set the parking brakes, so looks like the train just rolled, fortunately that is an area in the northern plain, so the track was almost running flat and the train did not build up too much speed. The investigation is still in progress.
Sadly, our courts do not have the brains or guts to do the right thing. Thus, our trains look like rolling junk heaps.
It just started one or two years ago, before there were even some judges who ruled these were work of art ..... In any case, as predicted, the carriages will be scrapped in place.