Fascinating Horror - On the 28th of February, 1975, at MoorgateTube Station in London the worst peacetimeaccident ever to happen on the London Undergroundtook place.
The cause of the devastating crash of a fully-loadedtube train was eventually found to be theactions of a single man… but to this dayexactly why he took those actions is stilla mystery.
The Northern City Line is a unique line onthe London Underground network.
It was first opened in 1904, and was designedto allow the mainline trains which servedthe rest of the UK to run directly into theheart of London.
Mainline trains were bigger than standardLondon Underground trains, and so for thefirst few years of its operation the NorthernCity Line was colloquially referred to asthe “Big Tube”.
The Northern City Line changed hands manytimes over the years, and was eventually integratedinto the London Underground Network in the1930s.
It was a busy line, running from FinsburyPark on the outskirts of Central London toMoorgate in the very centre of the city.
Moorgate Station, then, was the terminus ofthe Northern City Line.
For trains pulling in to platform nine ofthe station, it was literally the end of theline.
At the end of the platform the track continuedonly a short distance before ending in a concretewall.
This short length of extra tunnel was installedin case trains overshot the station.
In 1975 it was filled with a trough of sandto slow down any train that did enter, andwas also equipped with a mechanical buffer…although this was out of order at the time.
A red warning light illuminated the tunnel,making it absolutely clear to drivers thatit was a dead end.
Given that trains were mandated to enter thestation at a maximum speed of 24 kilometres(or 15 miles) per hour, it was a rare eventfor a train to overshoot into the runoff tunnelby any distance at all.
The 28th of February started out as a verynormal day for 56-year-old Leslie Newson.
He had been driving trains on the London Undergroundfor six years, and during that time had garnereda reputation as a careful and conscientiousdriver who always stuck to the rules.
That morning he got into work at just after 6:00 a.m. He had with him his work satchel, in whichhe’d packed his motorman’s rule book,a notepad containing his personal notes onhow to be a better driver, and his own supplyof milk and sugar for his morning cup of tea.
He also had with him £270 in cash, as heintended to go and finalise the purchase ofa car for his daughter once his shift wasover.
To every colleague who saw Mr Newson thatmorning he appeared normal and cheerful.
When one man asked to borrow some of his sugarfor their cup of tea, he agreed, but askedthem to “go easy on it,” saying, “Ishall want another cup of tea when I comeoff duty.
”Everything appeared normal as Mr Newson startedwork for the day.
He would be driving a train back and forthbetween Drayton Park and Moorgate, ferryingup to 300 commuters into and out of the citywith each trip.
After three trips back and forth, all wasroutine.
The train departed Drayton Park and made itsway back to Moorgate for the last run of themorning before Mr Newson was due to take abreak.
It arrived at Moorgate at 8:46am… but unlikeas in previous journeys, it did not slow orstop when it entered the station.
It carried on at full speed through the stationand into the run-off tunnel.
There, with no application of the brakes,it ploughed into the sand trough, smashedthrough the non-functional buffers, and slammedinto the concrete wall at the end of the tunnel.
The force of the impact was immense.
Passengers were flung to the front of theircarriages, while the front of the train crumpled,compressing down a space that had accommodateda dozen seats into a space the width of justtwo seats in a single moment.
One survivor described their experience ofthe crash:“Everybody sort of looked at each otherand wondered what was happening and the nextyou knew was the train suddenly came to adead stop and I was flung forward about nineor ten seats, and I landed with a group ofpeople by the doors all on top of each other.
”Another survivor reported on the reactionof the passengers on board:“It was pitch black.
People were picking themselves up, askingeach other how they were.
A few people were moaning ‘help me’ andthings like that… but most of all peoplewere saying ‘don’t panic’.
And they didn’t panic.
”While surviving passengers worked to keepone another calm, witnesses who had been standingon the platform of Moorgate Station raisedthe alarm.
It took some time for appropriate help toarrive, with first responders initially believingthey were attending a train that had merelycollided lightly with a set of buffers.
The first medical personnel on scene werea doctor and two nurses from the medical unitof the nearby British Petroleum headquarters,who attended on foot after being contactedby the police.
They quickly realised that they were ill-equippedfor the scale of the disaster.
The doctor returned above ground and wentto a nearby Boots high-street chemist, wherehe successfully requisitioned their entiresupply of morphine and other painkillers.
Even once firefighters and police were onscene, the rescue effort was an extremelychallenging one.
Not only was the space difficult to access,but it quickly became very hot as well.
The London Underground relies on the movementof trains through the system to push freshair into stations.
Following the crash, all movement on the linewas halted, and with no fresh air being flushedin, the temperature quickly rose to above40 degrees Celsius (or 104 degrees Fahrenheit)– a sweltering environment for firefightersand police to work in.
It was so hot, in fact, that rescuers wereallowed only 20 minutes at a time in the tunnelbefore they were required to come out andrest, lest they become casualties themselves.
Despite these impossible conditions, manypeople were extricated from the wreckage andtaken to nearby hospitals.
In total, 43 people died in the crash, and74 were injured.
Over the course of several days followingthe accident, firefighters worked in painfullyhot conditions to cut through the wreckageand recover bodies, with the body of Mr Newson,the driver, finally being recovered on the4th of March.
In the aftermath of the disaster, many questionswere left unanswered.
An investigation was carried out to try anddetermine what had caused the accident.
Suspicion quickly fell on Mr Newson.
Multiple witnesses who had been waiting atMoorgate Station noted that they had seenMr Newson at the controls of the train asit barrelled through without stopping.
He had, by all accounts, been sitting uprightwith his hands on the controls, consciousand with his eyes wide open.
In addition to this, trains at the time wereequipped with a “dead man’s handle”– a lever that required constant pressure.
Should pressure against this lever ever cease,the train would automatically brake… buttests showed that the dead man’s handlehad been pushed forward until the very momentof impact.
These two factors made it almost certain thatMr Newson had not fallen unconscious at thecontrols.
The brakes were removed from the train, testedextensively, and found to be in full workingorder.
Mechanical failure, then, was also ruled out.
It appeared that the train had been intentionallycrashed by Mr Newson… but exactly why wasuncertain.
There was no indication that he should wantto end his life: he had made plans (specificallyto purchase a car for his daughter) for laterthat day, and was a happy and contented man.
He rarely drank, and was an unusually carefuland attentive driver.
Although his blood alcohol on post-mortemwas found to be high, it was noted that thismight have been due to the process of decompositionhis body had undergone before testing.
It would be extremely out of character forhim to drink before a shift, and nobody hadnoticed any odd behaviour that morning.
Additionally, even if he had been drunk tothe level indicated by his post mortem bloodalcohol, it would not have explained his completelack of reaction when passing through MoorgateStation.
Though it is now impossible to confirm anytheory, it is thought that Mr Newson mighthave suffered a rare form of medical emergencywhile at the controls of the train.
Several kinds of seizure can take place thatdo not cause a person to lose consciousness,but instead cause them to briefly lose awarenessof where they are and what they are doing,or to compulsively repeat the action theywere taking when the seizure began.
The dead were honoured at a memorial serviceat St Paul’s Cathedral later in March ofthat year.
Over two thousand people attended.
Many years later, in 2013, a memorial waserected close to Moorgate Tube Station, bearingthe names of those who died in the crash.
The Northern City Line continues to operatetoday, ferrying thousands of passengers totheir destination each week.
In the aftermath of the crash, a new automaticbraking system was added.
Timed train stops on the track will now detecttrains moving at excessive speed, and causethem to automatically come to a stop if necessary.
Thanks to these changes, another accidentlike the Moorgate Tube crash is vanishinglyunlikely.
Though the exact cause remains unknown, proactiveaction has nonetheless been taken to preventa repeat of this tragedy. (The Moorgate Tube Crash)
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