Background
Sjursøya is a small peninsula located to the immediate south of Oslo, the capitol of Norway (population as of January 2021: 697010) in northern Europe. The entire peninsula is used by the Port of Oslo, serving as one of Norway’s main oil ports.
Its role as a major cargo-hub for Norway means the Port of Oslo offers access by water (obviously), road and rail, holding a small network of dead-end tracks to deliver and receive cargo. The harbor’s railway infrastructure connects to the Loenga-Alnabru Line, a 7.3km/4.5mi single track freight only electrified railway line opened in 1907 to remove freight traffic from the Østfold Line, meaning freight trains no longer went through Oslo main station. Except for just 400m/1300ft of track the entire line has a gradient, going downhill at up to 2.6 percent on its way south. 6km/3.7mi north of Sjursøya the line terminates at the Alnabru Freight Terminal, a large shunting yard handling over 500 thousand standardized containers a year by means of 3 cranes, 4 on-site trucks, 3 reach-stackers (specialized front-loaders for containers) and over 30 railway tracks. The shunting yard is squeezed into the eastern part of Oslo, taking up a large part of the Alnabru district.
The train involved
On the day of the accident a set of 15 empty flatbed and pocket freight cars for containers had been parked on the northern side of Alnabru Freight Terminal. The train consisted in part of 11 six-axle long wheelbase cars for 2 full sized shipping containers (it has to be noted that, in Europe, containers on train cars aren’t stacked the way they are in North America), semi-trailers or swap bodies. These special oversized cars work by having a bogie with two axles at either end while the center rests on a single, shared two-axle bogie allowing some articulation. This allows for shorter trains with the same cargo capacity as well as less maintenance by skipping one set of axles and couplers compared to conventional freight cars.
The remaining train consisted of 4 two-axle flatbed cars for a single shipping container or swap bodes, with a 5th being added to the train during the unfolding catastrophe. Once completed (16 cars) the train measured 458m/1503ft in length at a registered weight of 435.5 metric tons. The train cars were owned by CargoNet AS, a mostly (55%) government-owned freight train provider created when the NSB (Norway’s national railway) sold 45% of their freight division to the Swedish “Green Cargo” company. The shunting yard at Alnabru is the company’s main hub, from where the company runs freight trains (mostly carrying containers and semi-trailers) all over Norway and Sweden (with the train cars sometimes continuing into other countries). Most of the company’s rolling stock can be identified by a dark gray-yellow paint scheme, reminiscent of their logo (which uses the same colors).
The accident
On the 24th of March at approximately 1:00pm a shunting locomotive pushed an empty two-axle flatbed car towards a 15 car group of other flatbed and pocket cars, planning to add the car to the group as the crew was waiting for an incoming train. The group was parked with the brakes released, being held by a pinch-brake built into the tracks. After coupling the freight car to the train the shunting assistant returned to the locomotive. The driver then used a remote control to disconnect from the train cars without leaving the cab of the locomotive. The crew then radioed the traffic controller inquiring about the status of the incoming train, being told that it was just arriving that moment, and requested that a path be set for them to head over to it. Erroneously the controller assumed that the shunting crew was taking the group of empty cars to be loaded before heading to the arrived train. Concluding that this meant the locomotive was still attached to the group he went and released the brakes in the track, unknowingly releasing the brake-less and locomotive-less train.
By 1:04pm the shunting crew radioed the controller asking why they hadn’t been permitted to move to the new train yet. At this point the shunting assistant saw that the train cars had started moving away from the stationary locomotive and alerted the controller. Attempts to divert the runaway train into a dead end or a free track with another brake failed, leaving the train to roll out of the shunting yard unpermitted by 1:07pm at a speed of approximately 25kph/16mph. Had the train contained a powered-up locomotive running a red signal would have automatically applied the brakes, bringing the whole thing to a harmless end within a few hundred meters. But with no locomotive the signaling-system couldn’t track the train, neither could any auto-stop be triggered. Knowing the train was both out of his control and entirely out of control the local traffic controller notified his superior at Oslo main station. By coincidence the train had ended up on the Loenga-Alnabru Line and not the nearly-entirely parallel main line, meaning it would not end up in Oslo main station or endanger any passenger trains. As the train moved through Oslo, slowly picking up speed on its downhill journey, the traffic controller in Oslo main station contacted his coworker at Loenga station (further down the line) and discussed possible options to handle the escalating problem. The train was headed for Loenga station, where it could be led into tracks 7, 8 or 10. Tracks 7 and 8 were occupied by freight cars undergoing small repairs by two workers, it was chosen to not end the runaway train’s journey by letting it run into the parked train cars as there was no time to safely locate, notify and evacuate the workers. This strategy hat been used for an occupied runaway train in Switzerland in 2006, leading to 3 fatalities, but even there the people on the track had managed to evacuate. As such the controllers decided to divert the runaway train into track 10, ordering a local freight train occupying it at the time to proceed into a turn-off.
Railway workers at the site placed a special device in the tracks designed to derail an out of control train car when it ran over the device. The southern end of track 10 laid in a downhill curve, derailing the inside wheelsets was seen as sufficient to lift the train cars out of the tracks and stop the train with the smallest possible damage and risk. A portable derailer clamps over the track and uses a steel wedge to push one side’s wheels up and to the side, causing train cars to derail.
At 1:12:40pm the train cars entered track 10 at Loenga station, travelling at approximately 125kph/78mph. The leading train car struck the derailer with a loud bang and kept going, with the device failing to derail any of the train cars. Once the train passed railway workers found the derailer 275m/900ft down the track, sheared off its base by the forces inflicted on it by the heavy and fast train. By 1:13:15 the train cars reached Kongshavn, entering the harbor. Crossing through a roundabout (miraculously not striking any vehicles while crossing 3 roads) the eighth car in the train (a two-axle container car) derails at a set of points and pulls the cars 9–16 with it as it separates from the train. The freight cars overturned and ground to a stop in the harbor, causing severe damage to the track, a nearby building and several parked cars and trucks.
The forward part of the train (estimated at 194 metric tons, measuring 207m/679ft in length) continued on past a pump station for jet fuel tanker cars while still travelling in excess of 110kph/68mph. The points were still set from the regular train transporting jet fuel from the harbor to the airport, which had left a short time prior and was at the airport 40km/25mi linear distance away. As the train cars barrel through the harbor a person walking near the tracks is struck by the speeding freight cars and dies on the spot. The harbor’s railway infrastructure is designed for slow speed trains/shunting, usually trains there move at around a tenth of the runaway train’s speed. Having entered the Sjursøya peninsula at 13:15:25pm the freight train tears a buffer stop out of the ground, speeds across a parking lot and crashes into a building at the gate to the container terminal. The leading three train cars drill their way straight through the small single story structure, killing two more people before exiting the building on the other side. The leading car detaches from the train and comes to a rest on the quayside, damaging several parked vehicles, while cars 2 and 3 head straight ahead after leaving the building, crossing over a moored tug boat and end up falling into the harbor basin. Having been robbed of two of its walls the entrance building collapses in on itself within seconds of being struck by the train. In the end 3 people die in the accident, while 4 people survive with injuries (3 of which suffering life threatening injuries).
Aftermath
The NNRA (Norwegian National Rail Administration) had notified emergency services of the runaway freight train headed for the harbor as early as 1:12pm, requesting a level three alert to be initiated for fire departments, police and medical rescue. By 1:14pm a witness at the site called the emergency services, reporting the derailment of the rear part of the train and demanding ambulances to be dispatched. The alert was forwarded to the police by 1:25pm, the same moment the first ambulance reached the derailed rear cars. Seeing the secondary, worse site in the distance the crew found a way around the wreckage and continued on to the peninsula. Within the next 20 minutes 20 further ambulances, three medical evacuation helicopters and 11 units from the fire department (totaling 29 people) reached the site. Knowing that there was no locomotive driver to rescue or recover the effort focused on rescuing injured survivors from the collapsed entrance building and checking damaged/destroyed parked vehicles for occupants. By 1:57pm the injured survivors had been taken to a local hospital and most ambulances were withdrawn, with two crews remaining on site in case more injuries were discovered or to occur during the recovery of the train.
Having destroyed part of the roads, tracks, access-infrastructure and one of the tugboats the derailment essentially shut down the entire harbor’s operation for the time being. The shunting yard was also shut down temporarily until it could be figured out how the train had started moving on its own. A theory that the shunting locomotive bumped the train hard enough to get it moving was soon ruled out, as was a defect to the pinch brake that had held the train. When investigators discovered the brakes on the train to be fully operational but disabled attention turned to the shunting assistant and the local traffic controller at Alnabru. 3 people were dead, 4 more were hurt, someone had to explain what happened and how it happened. It was the second runaway freight train in Norway in 3 months, this had to stop.
The shunting assistant was 53 years old at the time of the accident and had worked for CargoNet for 8 years with another 16 years of experience in the job for other companies before that. He said that he had hooked the single train car up to the rest of the train before observing his coworker disconnecting the locomotive from the train. He knew the brakes on the train weren’t on, but since the cars were held by the pinch brake he didn’t worry about it at the time. His statement also indicated that the train had been at a standstill and secured when the locomotive was disconnected. However, this pointed the investigators to a glaring flaw in the operation. Railways in Europe operate under the “no single point of failure”-principle: If any single link in the event-chain of operations fails this cannot lead to serious bodily injury or death for anyone. So even if the pinch-brake failed or was disabled by accident this shouldn’t have sent the train on its fatal way. Usually a shunting yard would see to this by having train cars parked with the brakes applied or by using so called run-off points or “trap points”. These are, to put it simply, cut down sets of points that don’t divert a train into another track but just off the track into open (usually soft) ground. These points would usually be automatically set to derail a train until they are moved into the “pass through” position for an approaching train and then move back.
The set of train cars had been parked on track A5 at the shunting yard, which wasn’t meant for train storage and thus only had two pinch brakes and no other safety-mechanisms. The common practice of placing derailers or brake shoes next to stored train cars as a backup safety was found to be nonexistant at the yard. This allowed the train cars to leave track A5, roll past the control tower at the center of the freight yard (which must’ve been quite the concerning sight) and then turn left (on a path left from the prior train into track G4 on the southern side of the yard. G4 had no run-off points, while G2 and 3 had systems like that in place but set up for manual operation rather than defaulting to “derail”. The trains could have been diverted into those two tracks, but by the time the runaway train was spotted it was too late to set such a path or send a worker to arrange the run-off points. Tracks G4 and G5 had no runaway train protection, meaning trains running away on those tracks either entered the Loenga-Alnabru line or the Hovedbanen between Eidsvoll and Oslo. With the latter also running passenger services the decision to direct the train towards the harbor instead of onto the Hovedbanen was an understandable choice meant to reduce the danger to the public. Investigators found that there was literally no preinstalled measure that could slow/stop/derail a runaway train once it leaves the freight yard. The mobile derailer placed at Loenga was engineered for a speed of no more than 50kph/31mph, that the freight train would destroy it at more than twice that speed could have been foreseeable. However, it is understandable that “we need to stop that train right now” took priority over thoroughly thinking about all options and their ability.
Interviewing the local traffic controller, who had been working for the Norwegian Railway since 1993 showed that he had gotten confused about what train the shunting crew was planning to move to or with. The shunting crew had planned to take the locomotive on its own to a different track where a recently arrived freight train was waiting to be broken up (separating the locomotive and selected cars). However, in the conversation the traffic controller assumed they meant they were taking the empty freight cars to be loaded. The A-tracks (which the train was on) weren’t meant for long-term storage of train cars, but this had still developed as an unofficial practice when traffic was low. The train cars weren’t scheduled to be loaded until 6pm, so technically they should have been moved to the G-tracks and secured there until being picked up again. Confusing movement-requests, schedules and official practice vs unofficial habits the driver released the pinch-brake holding the train cars. The shunting operator actually alerted the controller moments after the train cars started moving (using, among others, the term “Hva faen er det dere driver med?”, meaning as much as “what the fuck are you doing?” But by the time the controller had his hand at the controls for the brake the train had already passed it, and with that left the last chance to stop behind.
In May 2011 Oslo’s public prosecutor started the trial on charges of gross negligence, negligent homicide and negligent cause of bodily injury. By that point the local controller had already been relieved of guilt, he had set the train in motion but due to the lacking safety-systems he was not to blame for the unfolding catastrophe. Sitting in the court room was Miss Lind, who had lost her husband when the runaway train obliterated his office in the entrance building. Dying from being struck by a train while not even being near train tracks, it truly was a tragic turn of fate probably similar to the risk of being struck by lightning. While being in a basement. Miss Lind is one of two relatives of victims who are present for the trial, another witness is Mister Erlandsen, a truck driver who escaped the runaway train by a matter of a few feet. His trailer was struck by the train, spinning the whole truck around and folding the trailer around the truck. He recalls meeting one of the victims, Mister Nordmo, at the door to the building not 5 minutes before the accident. Morbidly, Nordmo told Erlandsen not to stress too much as “everyone has plenty of time in life”. A few moments later Nordmo was dead and Erlandsen found himself injured but alive, surrounded by debris and train cars.
The trial ended with large fines being handed down, with the NNRA being fined 15 million Norwegian Crowns (1.49 million Euros/1.8 million USD) and CargoNet being fined 7 million Norwegian Crowns (697329 Euros/839 thousand USD). The NNRA accepted the fine, while CargoNet protested their part of the fault and had a retrial started. They still had to pay 6 million Norwegian Crowns (598 thousand Euros/719 thousand USD). However, the second trial saw them cleared of the “gross negligence” charge. After the accident the safety-systems at Alnabru were upgraded, with new run-off points and sand-drags being installed. This means that if a train runs through the yard and isn’t stopped by the buffer it goes into a soft sandy bit, avoiding what happened at the harbor where the train barelled over a paved flat area. The control system was also upgraded, pressing two large red buttons at once will instantly break up any set path at the southern end of the yard and direct trains into the buffer stops instead. Furthermore the system will now sound a loud alarm if the runoff-points are set to the open track rather than the runoff for more than 5 minutes. The buffer stops are designed to slow a 1000 metric ton train by approximately 10kph/6.2mph and a 750 metric ton train by 15kph/9.3mph.
In the meantime CargoNet overhauled their training and guidelines, making it mandatory for parked train cars to have the brakes engaged and for no cars to ever move without being attached to a locomotive. Currently plans are in motion to construct a new, longer connection between the shunting yard at Alnabru and the Nordstrand-district in southern Oslo (south of the harbor). This longer route would have less of a gradient and allow heavier trains to reach the shunting yard, taking traffic off the roads and meaning less trains between the yard and the harbor.
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