In France, TGV Test Train Catches Fire, Derails, Killing 10 (mirror.co.uk) 129
McGruber writes with the Mirror's report that: Earlier today in Eckwersheim, France, TGV (Train à Grande Vitesse) 2369 Test Train caught fire, derailed and overturned. Two carriages were partially submerged into a river and at least five people were killed. As of now, there are no direct links with the terrorist attacks on Paris and the train crash does not appear to have been caused deliberately. A TGV test train holds the record for the fastest wheeled train, having reached 574.8 km/h (357.2 mph) on 3 April 2007. Today's derailment appears to have been the first fatal crash of a TGV while running at high speed.
NBC News reports that 10 people were killed, all employees of the French national railway system.
NBC News reports that 10 people were killed, all employees of the French national railway system.
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
No. This was a track-test. No passengers aboard. Not a worthwhile target, just incompetent engineers. And, ironically, attacking a train track is far more difficult than the amateur-level attacks in Paris. The problem is just that a city like Paris cannot be defended against attacks by a very small group, even if that small group is terminally incompetent. Pointing a gun at people and shooting is easy and doing in in several places is so too.
The other, far more serious problem, is that those in power are in
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Terrorist organizations are generally very small. Attacks have two goals: terrorize the victims and get publicity to recruit more terrorists. If you shut down the publicity then you deny both those objectives.
Covering up terrorist attacks probably isn't a good idea. But publicizing them as a small number of criminals who committed a horrible crime is a lot better than millions of people wringing their hands and screaming about how the terrorists are winning.
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Indeed. And you should ridicule them at every possible opportunity as _stupid_ criminals. Because they typically are.
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When the other alternative is far worse, then that is what you do. Seriously. You cannot "fight" terrorism by throwing more violence at them. That has been amply demonstrated. That way you just make them stronger.
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Climbing over a fence and placing a block is pretty easy.
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Climbing over a fence and placing a block is pretty easy.
And a drive-by shooting is hard?
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And will usually fail.
Speed to blame says Guardian (Score:2)
Oh dear - but better than a terrorist attack. Actually high speed trains are an easy target - I'm surprised they haven't been attacked before now
Re:Speed to blame says Guardian (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm surprised they haven't been attacked before now.
What did you think the French Resistance did throughout WW2?
The reason civilians aren't being killed en masse every day isn't because nobody's thought of a way to do it, nor because we have near-perfect security services, but because nearly everybody alive has no desire whatsoever to commit mass murder. But humans have no conception of statistics, so we get hysterical over 0.0002% of Muslims in France attacking under 0.01% of Parisiens, even while routine transport accidents kill hundreds every day throughout Europe. (And don't get me start on genuine suicide through mental illness, which receives less and less attention of health services.)
N.B. I still think those responsible in France are murderous bastards. My mother studied in Paris and I've enjoyed a lot of time there. But I am capable of putting things in proportion.
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Right on the mark. The first thing is that such attacks _cannot_ be prevented. No, really not. You can only do a lot of damage trying to, like creating a police state or worse. The US has demonstrated how to be utterly stupid that way since 9/11. The second thing is that such attacks rarely ever happen and, compared to other causes, are not a relevant risk of death or injury, because almost all people that con do this (and those are very, very many, just think what a competent chemical engineer or physicist
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Islam is disproportionately the religion of terrorist murderers in the world. It is not a coincidence, it is not the result of poverty. The Koran teaches psychopathy, and as long as Islam is allowed to survive, terrorism and the other hideous aspects of this abominable religion will continue.
Civilization or Islam. Choose one.
Re: Speed to blame says Guardian (Score:2)
This statement used to be true. Things can change and the religion won't be blamed. Having a huge pool of underprivileged sex-starved young men at your disposal leads to easily radicalization.
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Middle eastern muslims thought pretty much the same thing about the murderous christian barbarians who invaded their heartland a thousand years ago. Both the bible and koran, and most other holy books, have some incredibly nasty bits. The vast majority of adherents to any major religion ignore those parts.
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murderous christian barbarians who invaded their heartland a thousand years ago
Wow history much. The crusades were a response to Islamic expansionism and the fact that Islam was cutting off the path from Europe to the holy land. The Crusaders were hardly barbarians and the crusades were NOT unprovoked.
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murderous christian barbarians who invaded their heartland a thousand years ago
Wow history much. The crusades were a response to Islamic expansionism and the fact that Islam was cutting off the path from Europe to the holy land. The Crusaders were hardly barbarians and the crusades were NOT unprovoked.
Considering the Crusaders actually did most of their killing in Europe - yeah, Barbarians would never do that.
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Yeah right, hardly barbarians. How do you explain the crusades against the Czech, Balts and Russians then?
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Bullshit. There have been enough Christian psychos in history and even atheist ones. The problem is not the religion. The problem is the psychos.
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No one is claiming that only the religious are psychos.
But if being a psycho was a game of football, they're starting the game with 12 players.
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You are ignoring every other factor in the equation and focussing on some very visible characteristics, then ravaging what sanity was left by heaping on confirmation bias. This is how xenophobes and racists come to the conclusions they do.
If what you said is true, then the millions of Muslims living around the world would be running around killing everyone. As there are over 1.6 billion Muslims, we'd all be dead. As you are reading this, that's proof enough that you are wrong, and woefully ignorant to th
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I think you are being a little bit too categorical. There are simple things that can be done to prevent terrorist attacks and it makes sense to do those things.
For example, it makes sense that if someone checks in a bag at the airport but does not board the plane, the plane does not get to fly until that particular luggage has removed. I'm sure that 9999 times out of 10000 it's just that the passenger has fallen asleep while waiting for the plane, but being a little late is still a cheap price to pay to avo
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You logic is fundamentally flawed:
You seem to think that if you make it harder to place a bomb in airport luggage, then the terrorist will go home defeated and cry. That is complete nonsense. The bomb will just be placed somewhere else more vulnerable. And there will always be a lot of targets to chose from in a free society.
And then, what does recognizing people help, if you DO NOT KNOW who is preparing such an attack? Incidentally, "catching 10% of the Infiltrators" does not help one bit. Apparently you m
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Every obstacle that you put between people and their goals have a filtering effect. If you catch X% of terrorists, then the number of attacks will drop by X%, to a first approximation at least. Keep in mind that most terrorists aren't geniuses and that terrorist have limited amounts of motivation and imagination.
It is true that the government and other security workers are incompetent, but that incompetence is not complete and utter, it is only partial, which means that it can be measured as a percentage. I
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As I said, you model is wrong. The "filtering effect" is a pure fantasy for this case. You cannot "deter" a "would-be" terrorist, as these do not exist. People that become terrorists are exceptionally strongly motivated to carry out their attacks. It is not some minor shift in attitude. There is a threshold-effect at work and everything beneath the very high threshold has no effect at all. Reaching this high threshold generally is not possible in a free society.
You model is that of a typical theorist that h
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So how do you explain that the luggage compartment bombings largely stopped after measures were put in place?
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1. Bombings in other places
2. Less bombings overall for unrelated reasons
Seriously, you can shift where terrorists attack, but you cannot prevent the attacks by guarding a few possible targets better. Terrorists do not strike because they see an opportunity for fun, they strike because they are hardened fanatics.
Re:Speed to blame says Guardian (Score:5, Insightful)
Most people understand and accept the risks of accidental deaths for the sake of modern conveniences, like driving in cars, flying commercial airliners, and of course, taking trains like this. The reason we react the way we do to terrorism is because it's a deliberate, cold-hearted act of barbarity that takes the lives of innocent people for the sake of politics, ideology, religion, or some combination thereof. The tragedy of the Paris attacks is not that so many people died. As you point out, probably more people died in traffic accidents that day in Europe. The tragedy is that those people died so needlessly.
While this presumed accident is sad, particularly for the family and friends of the victim, they can take comfort in knowing that perhaps this will lead to safer operations for others in the future. We tend to learn our hardest lessons from accidents like these. Hopefully future trains will be safer as a result of the investigation into whatever went wrong here.
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Most people understand and accept the risks of accidental deaths for the sake of modern conveniences, like driving in cars, flying commercial airliners, and of course, taking trains like this. The reason we react the way we do to terrorism is because it's a deliberate, cold-hearted act of barbarity that takes the lives of innocent people
You've not driven much, have you? Crashes are about 95% human error. Deliberate errors are most of those. The act of running the red was quite deliberate. The act of speeding while doing it. The act of hitting the other car may not have been deliberate, but then, if you point a gun and fire at someone, nobody assumes it was unintentional until proven otherwise, but with cars, it's the opposite. But the large number of insanely poor drivers allowed on the road, killing a 9/11 worth of people every mont
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Most drivers, most of the time, drive well, or there would be accidents continuously, literally everywhere.
Nope. You can drive quite poorly and still not have a crash. It takes 2 or more drivers driving poorly to have a crash, or one driver driving quite negligently or maliciously. There are literally accidents continuously and everywhere. Over 100 deaths a day in the US, or 3200 per day world-wide. Over 6500 injured per day. Roughly 1% of Americans are injured in a crash each year. Continuo
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It takes 2 or more drivers driving poorly to have a crash
Yes, that has been my observation as well. It is amazing how robust the traffic system is, considering how faulty the people are who make it up.
Continuously and everywhere.
You probably wanted the word "continually" here.
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You probably wanted the word "continually" here.
Just using the A/C's words as they used them.
If people were better drivers, we'd not only have fewer crashes, but no traffic.
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It's also worth pointing out that terrorist groups will make themselves more and more annoying until they are dealt with. Better to deal with them when the numbers are smaller, rather than waiting until the casualties are significant.
Well, the British should have acted sooner, before the terrorists got their own state out of their actions.
And remember to kill as many innocent civilians as possible while fighting terrorists, that way they can''t become infected with terrorism.
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If by "deal with them" you mean discuss their grievances, I totally agree. If their grievances are valid, deal with them. If they are not, you've just shown their cause to be completely without merit. The British took a long time to realise that they had to talk with the terrorists (thanks, Maggie, for delaying that as long as possible!). Once that happened, the Brits realised the republicans' grievances were legitimate, and afterwards both sides worked towards peace, both losing political clout in the
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High speed trains have been attacked -- a French TGV was bombed in 1983. Two people were killed by the bomb.
At the same time a bomb, placed by the same group, went of in a toilet in a railway station -- it killed 3 people.
So toilets are better targets than high speed trains.
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What do yo mean? Have you forgotten already the august 21 attack on the Thalys train? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
In Germany there have been a number of attacks on railroads, most in connection with leftist terror groups.
But even though. It is probably hard to effect the same result. Even a major crash like the ICE at Eschede had less casualties than this Paris attack.
I was thinking of targetting the track (Score:2)
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ITYM "Je suis Eagles Of Death Metal".
Overspeed kills (Score:2, Informative)
Driving faster than the tracks allow is dangerous regardless of the absolute speed. Die Mariazellerbahn in Austria showed this quite clearly in 1981. A train was driving too fast, derailed on a bridge and the locomotive fell off and killed the driver. I can't find the actual speed or speed restriction, but with a locomotive top speed of 50 km/h, it would be a high speed accident in slow motion. It was the first AC electric locomotive class btw, operating from 1911 to 2013 and the other 15 engines survived a
Fire before the accident? (Score:5, Informative)
Says who? From pictures I've seen any fire was _after_ the accident and pretty limited. Who exactly is spreading this (dis)information?
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Says who? From pictures I've seen any fire was _after_ the accident and pretty limited. Who exactly is spreading this (dis)information?
How about you stop spreading FUD?
All reports and eye witness accounts do in fact state that the fire was the result of the bridge strike. And guess what happens to a burning train hurtling out of control down the tracks? Maybe it would derail and overturn?
But you're seen photos. So I guess we are all wrong.
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Who exactly is spreading this (dis)information?
(Di)ce? :p
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>:-(
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Says who? From pictures I've seen any fire was _after_ the accident and pretty limited.
I'm amazed at your ability to determine if there was a fire burning before an accident based on seeing a picture of a fire burning after an accident.
Who exactly is spreading this (dis)information?
By all accounts a Slashdot users called phayes
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The train ended up partially in a canal and the burned parts I saw were limited to an emerged section with the adjacent submerged section showing no signs of fire. So, really really hard for someone like you to see if the fire was before the accident and easy for everyone else.
Test train, no regular passengers (Score:5, Informative)
Just as a reminder, this is a test train crash, not in service, only 49 people inside, all employees.
Excessive speed may be the cause but it is yet unconfirmed.
I don't believe in a link with terrorists attacks. What terrorist would attack a test train? Especially one that is has nothing special. For a successful train attack, it is probably the one that will get you the least attention.
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Just as a reminder, this is a test train crash, not in service, only 49 people inside, all employees.
Yet they are still people. The theory goes that people working with trains should know the risks involved (at least according to one internal document I once saw, not in France, but still regarding railroads). However it doesn't make much sense to me because what would have happened if 3 people claimed the test train to be too dangerous? Would they be fired for refusing work? Also who knew the train would be speeding? (if that's the cause). Even with expert knowledge, they could still be victims of one driv
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A mistaken one?
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You are aware that the attacks yesterday were by - mostly - Belgians? CLOSE THE BORDERS TO BELGIUM. You know it makes sense.
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I think that the common factor was their religion, not their nationality. I also think you know this but choose to ignore it.
The common factor was a terrorist ideology and strong ties to IS. The fact that their religion was the same is just as circumstantial as the fact that their nationality was the same. Relative to the total population of the group, it is in fact more correct to say this was a Belgian attack than to say it was an Islamist attack. Obviously it was neither.
I think you don't know this because you did not stop and think it through. The alternative explanation is less pleasant.
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You are picking a common factor and ignoring the others. If we want to play the "try and guess their motives using our limited understanding of their psyches" sure you're right. If we actually want to understand the issue, then you are massively wrong. If your point had any merit every single Muslim the world over would be murdering people. As they are not, you are clearly wrong. And a douche. Well played.
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You are aware that the attacks yesterday were by - mostly - Belgians? CLOSE THE BORDERS TO BELGIUM. You know it makes sense.
Nah - just make waffles out of them.
Glad It Wasn't Related To Yesterday (Score:3, Insightful)
It's of course tragic that the French National Railway employees were killed, but it probably would have been worse for the nation as a whole if this came out as another round of Islamist terrorism. It's a sad thing when ten people die, and you think something like, "well, at least they weren't murdered."
Hopefully, they'll be able to figure out what went wrong with the train and prevent any further tragedies (especially when the trains are loaded with passengers).
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It's a sad thing when ten people die, and you think something like, "well, at least they weren't murdered."
Sufficiently advanced negligence is indistinguishable from homicide.
Test Train (Score:1)
This test train was testing the new line.
The TGV that set the world record wasn't a test train. It was a set specially marshaled and modded for the record attempt.
Stop with the sensationalist bullshit already.
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Well, they got a clear test result. And in addition, they found out that their test protocols are fundamentally broken.
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on the plus side (Score:2)
Still, if your burning train leaves the track there is one small benefit in it finishing in a canal.
Looks like the Chernobyl kind of "accident" (Score:1)
I.e. stupid "engineers" not really understanding the technology they are using.
In this case: "Can it go even faster?" Result: No, it cannot.
In Chernobyl: "Can it cool itself?" Result: No, it cannot.
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Hey, from both things we learned something. Next on the agenda: Is touching a hot stove plate good or bad for your epidermis?
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Or rather: Is giving terrorists that just attacked you a lot of attention and a lot of threats and generally telling them that they had great success a good idea or not?
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In Chernobyl: "Can it cool itself?" Result: No, it cannot.
Actually reactor 3 more than likely could have cooled itself. The problem was that the operator took power levels down way below what the tests had been designed for, and then tried to overcompensate for the xenon core poisoning by retracting way too many control rods manually to raise power levels instead of doing the sane thing and aborting the test and finishing with a full shutdown.
That said, the reactor did have some rather large design flaws that after the initial operator err
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Sane test design takes this into account. Insane test design (as in Chernobyl) expects everything to go according to plan and does not look as the risks of running the test in the first place.
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Obviously you are unable to abstract. The question here was about realistic assumptions on the limits of a given technology _and_ what happens if these assumptions are wrong. You do not test an assumption about a nuclear power plant in a way that has it blowing up if you are wrong. You do not test an assumption about the speed a train can safely go in a way that has the train derail if you are wrong.
But "A literal mind is a stupid mind", so I do not expect you to be able to even understand what I am saying.
This was a test train (Score:2)
Test trains often run with the safety systems disabled and the train run manually at 10% above the normal maximum speed. If it's safe at this speed, you can be confident that it will be safe at operational speeds too. However, since it's run manually there is more potential for catastrophic human error, as seems to have been the case here.
Not an accident (Score:1)
Dr. Yellow (Score:2)
For a service car this is a pretty spectacular accident. By comparison the Shinkansen [Bullet Train] equivalent Dr. Yellow has never had such an accident.
Re: (Score:2, Funny)
Yeah, shut your mouth or a muslim will shut it for you.
PERMANENTLY.
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Free clue: the Maginot Line was not a train.
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If you're referring to the song, it was the Siegfried Line, indeed. For the uninitiated or those who are not into history, I've been less lazy and found you a link:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
It's kind of catchy.
Re:Maginot Line Repeat? (Score:5, Insightful)
Don't be an idiot. Since 1981, the TGV lines have carried one billion passengers without loss of life.
The accident was on a newly-constructed line not open to passengers yet. They have thoroughly simulated both the trains and the line, but at some point you have to switch from simulations and actually run a train on your new track.
And let's wait for the accident report before mouthing off about imagined incompetence, huh?
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That's because the US has Greens while France doesn't. We can only dream of being 85 percent nuclear.
Re:Maginot Line Repeat? (Score:4, Informative)
That's because the US has Greens while France doesn't. We can only dream of being 85 percent nuclear.
So, how many seats did the US Green party get in the last elections? Here in France they have 17 MP's, 12 senators and 6 MEP's.
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Fortunately, French Greens don't seem to be able to stop investment in infrastructure. Meanwhile, Greens in the US don't need a party of their own, because by taking advantage of the US legal system they can make any project they want too expensive to finish. Look at the spiraling budget for California's high-speed rail project, which is an off-the-shelf copy of your TGV.
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Fortunately, French Greens don't seem to be able to stop investment in infrastructure.
Because the airport at Notre-Dame-des-Landes, the dam at Sievens and the nuclear power plant at Plogoff were all constructed with no resistance,
Maybe you should stop commenting about things you know nothing about?
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I have spent a lot of time in France over the years, and what always impresses me is the easy coexistence between an epicurean culture and a technological culture. A look at history shows that it has always been that way. Look at the number of scientists who are memorialized in the Panthéon in Paris. Note that our own first ambassador to France was Ben Franklin. This basically healthy attitude toward science and technology gives the society the ability to fearlessly build large things. Cherry-picking a
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That's because the US has Greens while France doesn't.
Call me when a Green presidential candidate gets more than 5% of the popular votes in the US.
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It is a common misconception that the Maginot line in itself was a failure. It did its job. However, the German were simply better, and won. With better command on the French and Belgian side, it could have been effective.
As for the train crash, the cause is yet unknown.
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Let's hope it wasn't but I'd still not be surprised if it was fucking sand niggers.
You used two terms, RH and SN. RH could be Hindus, and they're not suspected. You must be accurate with your slurs or else people may think you're general hatter. (You also made the syntaxial error of being non-parallel when, apparently, you planed to be. Please be more careful.)
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I think you mean:
Mr. "general hatter!"
If we're going to be pedantic then punctuation is important.
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That is not used everywhere, as some people find that putting things inside quotes which are not being quoted is, well, sick :) By "some people" I mean programmers and British English speakers.
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You are utterly stupid. Or a terrorist yourself for trying to create even more fear.
This was a non-opened track under test. No terrorists attacks that as there is nothing to gain.