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Originally Posted by whatchutalkinboutWillis
Usual poor communication from Irish Rail, passengers on train told nothing
U do understand wha happened???
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Within the information available, yes.
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Do u really ??????? expect the driver to be able to make a announcement after such a thing...I'd be p*ssed if I was i stuck on tha train too, but I'd quickly understand wha happened when emergency services start arriving!
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I don't think anyone expected the driver to do anything other than to make the train safe and to call central control. The incident could very easily be traumatic to any person. While some people can take charge of an incident, it is very difficult to predict who will or won't and it is to be assumed, from the point of view of the railway company, that any individual driver or other staff member may be traumatised by such an incident. Our sympathy is with those that were directly involved in tonight's incident.
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I think that's a bit insensitive of you to put something up on a forum like than! After what happened I wouldn't expected a driver to be worrying about us in the back! A Call for help and let others take over when they arrive at the scene!
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What is expected is that after CTC received the call and following the notification of relevant incident teams, that CTC would make the announcement - we understand there is this capability. If this capability was not available, then, following their safety duties, that rail staff present* or a member of the Garda would advise passengers that there had been a serious incident, that the emergency services were present, the situation was under control, that they didn't know exactly when the train could be moved, but that they would try to keep them informed as best as possible and that they hoped for their understanding. They should also enquire if any passengers need or will need assistance.
* The Woodbrook bridges, if this is where the incident occurred, are 500-1500m from Bray station.
This does a number of things:
- It removes the temptation of people to take the situation into their own hands and attempt to get off the train in an uncontrolled and unsafe manner on a live railway, as happens from time to time.
- This also removes a burden from the emergency services, in that the won't have to try to control a crowd.
- It reduces anxiety and reassures the passengers that the situation is under control and reduces the scope for wild speculation.
- It empowers passengers to make decisions - "I need someone else to collect the kids from crèche", "I won't make that meeting", "I need to let someone know that I need to be home to take my medication" and so on.
- It prevents the railway being brought further into disrepute.
Away from the train, aside from the immediate response to the incident, we expect someone to be pro-actively managing the flow of information to passengers on other parts of the system. On the one hand, twitter was providing a series of responsive messages from someone in Irish Rail, but the website said nothing and platform and other displays were providing mixed messages. Bad or conflicting information is typically worse than no information.
As trains were terminating at Dalkey, passengers for Killiney could get the number 59 bus from the other end of the village. Passengers for Shankill and points south would need to change from train to bus at Dún Laoghaire or possibly some point north of that. A limited number of passengers could transfer to route 7 at Dún Laoghaire or Sandycove.
It shouldn't be up to Mark (in this instance) or I (recent casualty on Upper Leeson Street, which led to 4-hour bus curtailments) (a) to have to determine what has happened and (b) to be, at times, the sole source of meaningful information. There is an entire organisation of nearly 5,000 people and surely, between them, they can come up with an incident recovery plan and implement it.
Again, out sympathies to those involved last night and out condolences to the family of the deceased.