We haven’t learned lessons on rail safety

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2019/oct/06/we-havent-learned-lessons-on-rail-safety

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Your report on train safety (The Ladbroke Grove rail disaster: lessons to be learned 20 years on, 5 October) fails to mention that crucial recommendations by Lord Cullen for computerised automatic train protection (such as exists in most of Europe) to prevent trains going through red lights were never implemented. Instead, our railways still depend on a far from fail-safe train protection warning system based on magnets. Recently, the number of signals passed at danger (spads) has increased. In the past 12 months there have been 10 spads classified as having the potential to cause a collision. If there is another collision causing mass fatalities, everyone will ask why Cullen was not listened to. On the anniversary of the Ladbroke Grove crash, which saw 31 people die and many more injured, we should ask this now. Louise ChristianLead solicitor for the bereaved and injured in the public inquiry into the Ladbroke Grove train crash

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