And a more technical overview from RAIL:Some steam trains operating across picturesque routes have been suspended over fears they are a "threat to the safe operation of the railway".
Network Rail has halted West Coast Railways (WCR) services after the "most serious" case of a train failing to stop at a signal so far this year.
This means it cannot run chartered services until at least 15 May.
Network Rail said the decision had not been taken lightly. No-one from WCR could be reached for comment.
According to Rail magazine, it is an "unprecedented suspension" as, since privatisation, operators have been barred from certain routes but never hit with a total network ban.
A Network Rail spokesman said diesel and steam services were suspended from 00:00 on 3 April and would only resume if seven action points are addressed.
The spokesman said: "We have set out a number of actions to address the safety concerns raised and will continue to work with WCR to ensure their services can run safely in future."
The action points include:
* Introducing an "effective, risk-based driver monitoring regime"
* Reviewing procedures to make sure drivers understand all safety and operational information
* Establishing a plan with a deadline to implement actions from Network Rail's January review of the company's safety policies
Network Rail is concerned over a recent Spad (signal passed at danger) incident and the company's response to the problem.
Network Rail's suspension notice said it "ranked as the most serious Spad that has taken place this year when the industry risk ranking methodology was applied".
It said it happened at Wootton Bassett Junction in Wiltshire on 7 March when a WCR service between Bristol and Southend overshot signal SN45 which protects a busy junction.
The Rail Accident Investigation Branch (RAIB) is investigating.
Network Rail said the response from West Coast Railways was "inadequate", in a meeting held on Tuesday.
The Hogwarts Express is a WCR engine
The Carnforth-based company operates charter trips on the picturesque Settle to Carlisle line, which runs through the Yorkshire Dales, as well as, among others, a route taking in Fort William in the Highlands.
WCR owns the Hogwarts Express engine featured in the Harry Potter films that last month went on display at Warner Bros Studio Tour in Leavesden, Hertfordshire.
There's more behind a paywall, but the gist of what happened is that someone cut a huge fucking corner and came extremely close to killing or maiming several hundred people.Highly damaging repercussions are piling up for West Coast Railways following the serious Signal Passed at Danger (SPAD) by its steam charter on March 7, in which a 100mph collision was avoided by barely a minute (see separate story).
Network Rail quickly responded with an unprecedented network-wide suspension of WCR’s track access rights from April 3, with the hardline comment that “recent events lead NR to believe that the operations of WCR are a threat to the safe operation of the railway”.
Meanwhile, the Office of Rail and Road (ORR, formerly the Office of Rail Regulation) announced that it is “reviewing the company’s safety certification - needed to operate trains on the rail network”.
In simple terms, it has launched formal proceedings to revoke WCR’s safety certificate. This means that even if WCR satisfies the stringent NR demands to end the track access ban imposed until May 15, it would still be unable to run any trains itself if the ORR revocation goes ahead.
In addition, ORR is investigating possible criminal prosecution of WCR for health and safety breaches, for which there is already precedent (First Capital Connect in 2014, RAIL 771).
“Our initial investigation has found significant weaknesses in the company’s safety management systems,” an ORR spokesman told RAIL.
“ORR is carrying out further assessments to determine whether health and safety laws were breached, and the appropriate enforcement action required.”
Both ORR and the Rail Accident Investigation Branch (RAIB) are investigating the SPAD, which ranked as the most serious this year anywhere on the network. RAIL understands that both organisations have visited WCR’s offices to collect evidence.
Following the track access suspension, WCR released an official statement saying: “Passenger safety is our number one priority.”
It says in relation to “a recent breach of safety regulations”, WCR “considers this to be sufficient to carry out a full internal inquiry with the support of NR, and at this time will not be running trains under their current operator licence”.
Brief bit of technical background: British trains are fitted with a system that sounds an in-cab alarm whenever the train is approaching a signal, and the driver has about three seconds to hit an 'acknowledge' button or the emergency brakes kick in. It's supposed to stop the train if the driver is incapacitated and prevent "highway hypnosis". But if you don't manage to hit the button in time then you have to bring the train to a halt and call in an incident report and the train can't go anywhere until an inspector signs off on the locomotive and the driver alike being fit to proceed, which means huge disruption to the timetable and endless paperwork and the poor buggers running the signalbox wishing rectal cancer on you.
So what does the crew of a steam-hauled excursion train do when they fail to hit the button in time? They turn the stop-cock to disable the emergency brakes and hope to hell nobody noticed them suddenly slowing down. Unfortunately, this also disabled the "you're coming up on a signal" buzzer, as well as a second emergency braking system designed to trip if a train actually overshoots a red. This inevitably came back to bite them on the arse and the locomotive blew right through a danger signal going fast enough that it took them seven hundred yards to stop. They ended up parked right across a junction where an express passenger train had just passed through sixty seconds earlier.
Want to take a guess what happens when a steam locomotive, whose boiler is capable of doing a fine impression of a suitcase nuke if it fails catastrophically, gets T-boned by one of these things going a hundred miles an hour? "Dodged a bullet" does not begin to describe it...