Railway accident at Liverpool-Dingle station

The scene of the accident from 1901 in 2005

The railway accident at Dingle Station on December 22, 1901 was the first serious accident on an electrically operated railway in which several travelers were also killed.

Starting position

The station Dingle in Liverpool was a head station and the southern terminus of Liverpool Overhead Railway (LOR), an electric overhead railway, the dock along the Merseys joined together. A railway tunnel about 740 meters long formed the access to the underground station, this section of the route was opened in 1896.

accident

On December 22, 1901 around 5:38 p.m., the electric motor of a delayed railcar that was driving through the tunnel to the station and should have arrived there at 5:32 p.m. caught fire . The train stopped about 80 yards (73 meters) from the station in the tunnel. Fanned by the drafts created in the tunnel by the heat of the fire, the fire quickly spread to the other wagons and the underground railway systems . When the power supply to the power rail was switched off, the lights of the station also went out, so that the remaining people could not find their way to the exit through the smoke. Six people died and many others were injured. The station burned down completely and then had to be closed for about a year. As was found in the subsequent investigation, the inadequate preparation of the station and its staff for such an event was one of the reasons for the extent of the disaster.

Trivia

Together with the Liverpool Overhead Railway , Dingle station and its access tunnel were closed on December 30, 1956. The tunnel and underground station are now used by a car repair shop and are the last remaining structural remnants of the former Liverpool Overhead Railway .

On July 24, 2012, part of the tunnel collapsed and several houses above the tunnel had to be evacuated. Repair work on the tunnel began in October 2013, and residents were able to move back in from February 2014.

See also

• Metro accident at Couronnes station , a similar accident at Métro Paris about two years later
• List of rail accidents in the UK

literature

• Paul Bolger: Liverpool Overhead Railway & Dingle Station . On: Subterranea Britannica.
• RVJ Butt: The Directory of Railway Stations: details every public and private passenger station, halt, platform and stopping place, past and present . Sparkford 1995. ISBN 1-8526-0508-1
• Alan Jowett: Jowett's Railway Atlas of Great Britain and Ireland: From Pre-Grouping to the Present Day . Sparkford 1989. ISBN 1-8526-0086-1
• Lt Col HA Yorke: official accident report. Liverpool 1902. Available online (PDF)

Web links

• Railways Archive
• Dingle Railway Station on Disused Stations
• Private report (English) with pictures from the tunnel

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Bolger.
2. ^ Toxteth train tunnel collapse investigated. BBC , July 24, 2012, accessed June 16, 2017 . 
3. ^ Rob Pattinson: Work to begin on repairing collapsed Liverpool Overhead Railway tunnel. Liverpool Echo , October 7, 2013, accessed June 16, 2017 . 
4. ↑ Dingle tunnel collapse families anger at repair costs. BBC , May 12, 2014, accessed June 16, 2017 . 

Coordinates: 53 ° 22 '53 "  N , 2 ° 57' 32.7"  W.