Background
Langenwang is a municipality of 3401 people (as of 1951) in eastern Austria, located in the Steiermark-Region 57km/35mi north of Graz and 33km/20.5mi southeast of Mariazell (both measurements in linear distance). At the time of the accident, six years after WW2, the area was under British administration.
Langenwang has a station on the Southern Railway (“Südbahn”), a 259.7km/161.4mi mostly double-tracked main line connecting Vienna with the Slovakian border at Spielfeld. Opening in sections between 1841 and 1848 the southern railway is one of Austria's main railway corridors and is used for everything from regional and commuter trains to freight services and high speed trains. At the time of the accident Langenwang station had two tracks going through the station labeled track 1 (south) and 2 (north) along with two sidings labeled 3 (south) and 4 (north).
The trains involved
D589 was an express passenger service from Vienna to Rome (Italy), consisting of 12 train cars. The first two cars were a baggage car and a mail car in all-steel construction followed by 10 passenger cars of different types. The leading car was an Austrian bogie-car (named to contrast against cars with fixed axles), a four-axle second class passenger car with a wooden body mounted on a steel frame. The type had been introduced in 1907 and was still in use by the time of the accident due to equipment-shortages following the war. The bogie car was used exclusively by a group of Italian railway workers and their families from Venice and Ancona who had been invited to Vienna by the Austrian national railway (ÖBB). What specific type of car was used is not documented.
Pulling the express train was ÖBB 33.118, a large express train steam locomotive introduced in 1923 as the BBÖ 113 (at the time the austrian national railway was called BBÖ). Each ÖBB series 33 measures 20.7m/68ft in length at a service-ready weight of 85.2 metric tons. The type has two leading and four driven axles along with a four-axle tender to store coal. The locomotives can reach 100kph/62mph.
On the day of the accident express freight train 1851 from Vienna to Graz was being shunted at Langenwang station, making use of the sidings the station had at the time to park a few of its cars to the freight shed at track 3 (the southern siding) as the train was moved from track 4 (the northern siding) to track 3. The shunting was done by the freight train’s regular locomotive, a DB (German national railway) series 52. The series 52 is a so-called war locomotive, a type developed to be produced in large numbers as part of the war-effort to fight dwindling fleets. A series 52 measures 22.97m/75.3ft in length at a weight of 76 metric tons empty and can reach 80kph/50mph, being propelled by five driven axles. After being introduced in 1942 around 7000 were made, almost half as many as intended, with several hundred ending up in Austria after WW2.
The accident
In the early evening hours of the 24th of September 1951 D589 departs Vienna main station, heading for Rome (Italy). At the time part of the city was under Soviet control, with the necessary controls at the border to the british zones adding to the delays caused by various slow-speed zones. As such the train already had a notable delay by the time it reached the Semmering-area, 22km/14mi linear distance east of Langenwang station.
At the same time express freight train 1851 was being shunted at the station, having been split into several sections to exclude a number of cars from it to be parked at track 3. The freight train’s locomotive was pulling the train out of track 4 on the western end, intending to cross both main line tracks beyond the departure-signals before backing into track 3. The western departure-signals were rightfully set to “stop”, but guidelines at the time demanded that the entrance-signals were to be set to “stop” also to secure operations.
As D589 reached the town of Semmering the dispatcher at Langenwang station was informed that the train would be late. As such, he figured he could proceed with the shunting-operation, moving the freight train from track 2 through track 1 into track 3. He thus cleared the freight train to proceed, just as his coworker at Mürzzuschlag, the next town west of Semmering, notified him that D589 was approaching and just a few minutes out. The dispatcher at Langenwang worried about internal repercussions if he caused more delays by stopping the express train, for a mere freight train no less, so he chose to disregard the official guidelines in favor of preparing the fastest possible passage for D589. He turned the entrance-signal and the pre-signal for the entrance-signal green, signaling “all clear” and “expect all clear” respectively. He also unlocked the departure-signals to be able to switch them to green faster once the freight train, which had just started backing into track 3, was out of the way. He then left the signal box to help urge the shunting operation along.
The freight train was mostly in the siding when it had to stop and wait for a loose group of cars in the siding to be moved, just as D589 passed the green entrance-signal. D589’s driver proceeded to disregarded the departure-signal’s red pre-signal, going past it at full speed. At this point the collision was unavoidable.
Langenwang station’s dispatcher ran towards the approaching express train, signaling it to stop immediately. The driver saw the dispatcher and triggered an emergency stop, but at that point the train was only about 55m/180ft from the freight train, not nearly enough space to stop. D589’s locomotive crashed into the freight train at approximately 50kph/31mph and went right through two freight cars, derailing but proceeding to slide along on the ballast. The driver was thrown from the locomotive but survived, as did the fireman who was pinned against the controls and had to be cut free later. The baggage car and mail car separated from the locomotive during the collision and were forced into a temporary upright position, with the latter completely tipping over backwards onto its roof and crushing the leading passenger car beneath it. 16 people died in an instant, five would later succumb to their injuries. All of them had been part of the Italian group in the leading passenger car, which was utterly obliterated. 51 people were injured in the collision, 11 of which severely.
Aftermath
Guilt was quickly placed on the station’s dispatcher along with D589’s locomotive crew, the former for disregarding guidelines regarding shunting operations across main line track, the driver of the express for disregarding the pre-signal of the departure-signal, and finally his fireman for failing to correct his superior’s mistake. The three men were sentenced to jail time on charges relating to negligent manslaughter, having the duration of each sentence reduced on appeal. How many years they eventually spent in jail is not documented. The fireman of the freight train, who carried no fault in the accident, suffered from severe depression after the accident and finally took his own life in November of the same year, arguably becoming the twenty-second victim of the accident. At the time there was no support-system for survivors, access to support and therapy was difficult to say the least and it was often considered “weak” to not be back on duty soon after such events. It would take several decades until therapeutic support for survivors (and responders) became the norm.
The high number of fatalities was linked directly to the outdated wooden body construction of the leading passenger cars, which splintered apart as the stronger metal mail car came down on top of it. The ÖBB had already started production of the improved so-called “Spantenwagen” (“Ribbed cars”) in 1948. This new type of passenger car was created by replacing the wooden bodies of old passenger cars with metal bodies consisting of identical segments (each representing one window’s wall-section from the frame to the roof) that were installed on the old frames in the desired number. The strategy of using identical prefabricated pieces allowed a quick production of a large number of train cars, accelerating the retirement of the wooden bodies across different types of passenger cars without the time and cost of developing a new train car from the ground up. The “Spantenwagen”, which were structurally far superior to their wooden predecessors, remained in widespread service well into the 2000s on some branch lines and are still commonly used for historic trains.
At some point after the accident Langenwang station lost it’s sidings, and in 2018 a new station opened a short distance east of where the old station used to be. It consists of a platform on each side of the two tracks with no more sidings or freight infrastructure. Only about 300 passengers use the station per day, with most trains simply passing through.
The accident can’t be repeated nowadays since modern signaling-systems would automatically keep the incoming train from reaching the shunting freight train. Also, wooden-bodied cars haven’t been in regular service for decades and are a rarity even in historic trains.
Video
A camera crew captured footage of the aftermath and part of the recovery-operation, segments of the footage can be seen in the following video. Be aware that the footage can be distressing to some viewers.
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Thank you for reading part 150 (!) of this series!
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