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Report on the Derailment that occurred on 22nd October 1969 at Chelmsford in the Eastern Region British Railways

Document Summary

The report into the derailment of a freight train at Chelmsford in 1969.

This document was published on 18th January 1971 by Department of the Environment.

It was written by Lieut. Col. I. K. A. McNaughton.

This item is linked to the Accident at Chelmsford on 22nd October 1969

The original document format was Stapled Book, and comprised 8 pages.

This document was kindly sourced from Nick Smith and is in our Accident reports collection. It was added to the Archive on 11th June 2006.

Copyright Information

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"The train involved was a Class 6 Special train conveying military ammunition from Basingstoke to Felixstowe Dock formed of 27 covered vans of 10 foot wheel base and hauled by a diesel-electric locomotive. As the train was passing through Chelmsford station on the Down Main line at a speed of approximately 45 m.p.h., the 8th vehicle became derailed towards the adjacent Down platform and a short distance further on the train became divided between the 7th and 8th vehicles and a general derailment ensued. Both running lines were obstructed by the derailment and extensive damage caused to the platform coping, the track and the signalling equipment, No personal injuries were caused.

The initial derailment followed the characteristic pattern of previous derailments involving short wheelbased wagons, occurring on plain track where there were minor irregularities within the permitted tolerances and a subsequent examination of the wagon revealed no serious faults which could in themselves have caused a derailment, though there were indications that it might have had a tendency to oscillate laterally."