HUTT RAIL SMASH

Grey River Argus, 16 December 1943, Page 3

HUTT RAIL SMASH

RIVAL THEORIES

Public Inquiry Concludes

P.A. WELLINGTON, Dec. 15. The public hearing of evidence relating to the fatal derailment of the 7.25 a.m, Upper Hutt-Wellington passenger train, near Haywards, on November 8, concluded to-day. The Chairman of the Board of Inquiry, Sir Francis Frazer, intimated that it was hoped to hand the report to the Minister of Railways before the close of the year. t, Resuming his evidence, the Assist-ant-Chief Mechanical Engineer of Railways, Reginald J. Gard, said there was a programme for the conversion of the W.A.B. engines remaining in the South Island to the A.B. tender type, because they would have a better coal and water-carrying capacity. There was no other reason for the conversion. The witness said that he thought there was a misunderstanding about the weights obtained when W.A.B. 974 was first weighed after the derailment. He emphasised that the springs and compensating gear were untouched in all weighings. When an engine in an accident was damaged, it was picked up and taken to the shops and placed on the scales without any adjustments. He would have been greatly surprised,, and fadeed suspicious, if the weights had been as they should. The Chairman: Was there anything in the condition of the engine to indicate that there would have been any serious maldistribution of weights at the time of the accident ? Witness: No.

Percy Ray Angus, Chief Mechanical Engineer, N.Z. Railways, said that lie had formed a similar view of the cause of the derailment to that of Mr. Gard, but he had formulated a theory that the disturbance of the engine began at a point 120 feet back, where a substantial rise in the cant—twothlrds of an inch in six feet —occurred. Had there been any jamming of the compensating gear, he would have expected a derailment to have occurred on a six-chain curve further north. He had formed his theory be-' fore the inquiry opened, and had advanced it at a conference at which he and other mechanical branch and maintenance branch engineers were present. No comment was made by the maintenance branch engineers. Mr. Bertinshaw’s theory was never referred to him for an opinion, and he was in complete disagreement with it.

G. J. Bertinshaw, Chief Engineer of Railways, giving further evidence on matters about which the Board had made inquiry, described the provision of and the standards of ballasting, both on the railways generally,, ana on the Hutt section. Witness also ■ gave further information as to the type and age of the rails in the Hutt I line, and of the standard run-off of cant. ■> Explaining this evidence, the wit- - ness said that the standard 70-lb. rail was sufficiently strong for 15-tpn axle leads, but in the first weighings of W.A.B 974 after the November derailment, paii's of driving wheels had 17 tons 16s- cwt. and 16 tons 3J cwt. If these represented the weights at the time, of the derailment, the excess over the authorised weight was nearly four tons in one case, and over two tons in each of the other cases. These excessive weights might explain why the track was kicked out at one place to a 10-chafo radius. It appeared absurd to him that a difference of one-eighth of an inc’ could have any appreciable effect on an engine weighing 75 tons, equipped with modern compensating gear and springs. Witness said: “If the Locomotive evidence, attributing so much to this slight variation, is accepted. then from my long experience of almost 40 years connected with the track. I say. emphatically, that there is no main line in New Zealand that can be maintained to such a pitch of perfection, considering our narrow gauge and the class of country we traverse.’’ Witness said that he thought it was a question o_f whether the W.A.B. in running bunker-first did not violate the standard practice in that the centre rockers- were widely spaceci, instead of closely spaced! He had. previously, advanced the theory of the lamming of the compensation gear but he did not now restrict himself to that. He now suggested that there was an inherent defect in the trailing bogie of the W.A.B. running bunker first. 1 This concluded the evidence