A mishap at Basingstoke

On the 18th December 1989 the weather conditions in the Basingstoke area were fairly poor with a very fine mist in the air, this caused very bad rail adhesion with many trains overshooting the platforms.

A small overshoot is ok in a through platform but at 10:30 the shuttle from Reading was due. The shuttle does not go into a through platform but into the bay platform and that's one place you don't want to overshoot.

The impact was so harsh the piece of track the bufferstop was joined to became detached from the running line leaving the rear axle of the front bogie hanging in mid air.

The buffer stop had been forced under the concourse which resulted in the ends of the rails puncturing the walls of the passenger subway.

The Eastleigh breakdown crew had to cut the dumb irons on the front of the bogie as it was fouling the rail as it was being towed backwards, the unit was recovered and towed back to Eastleigh for repairs.

This unit wasnt very severely damaged as it was back in service not long afterwards and has since been preserved at the Lavender Line

We would like to thank Glyn Hiscock for telling us about the incident and letting us use his images