Rail accident investigators issue warning over sensors on landslide monitors
Accident investigators have issued an urgent safety warning that the railway’s landslide monitoring equipment may not work when the earth moves suddenly, after discovering sensors did not transmit when a landslip derailed an intercity train,The front wheels of an Avanti West Coast train from Glasgow to London came off the tracks on 3 November when it hit debris washed on to the track by heavy rain near Shap, Cumbria, while travelling at 83 mph,Fortunately, the train stayed upright and only four passengers were injured,Network Rail had installed remote earth monitoring equipment at the Shap site, a known risk area in times of high rainfall,Investigators have found that the sensors nearest the landslip picked up minor earth movements in the railway cutting, from four hours to two hours before the accident, below the level to trigger an alert.
But when the landslip occurred, the Rail Accident Investigation Board (RAIB) believes, the sensors were tipped over too quickly for them to detect the movement,Wireless signals also proved unable to transmit when the sensors were buried in the debris,The board has issued an urgent safety warning to the rail industry, saying: “Line-side monitoring equipment used on Network Rail-managed infrastructure may not be able to detect the failure of slopes in some circumstances,”It warned that “this equipment may not provide data as expected to support safety decision-making, particularly during extreme weather conditions”,The RAIB said Network Rail “should take urgent steps to consider and, if necessary, mitigate this risk”.
A spokesperson for Network Rail said: “We have one of the safest railways in the world, and the safety of passengers and our colleagues remains our first priority,“With extreme weather conditions becoming more frequent for all infrastructure managers, Network Rail is increasingly using new technology to monitor and report on the conditions of our embankments and cuttings, assessing areas for further development,“We fully support the RAIB’s report and will work with our supply chain to put the RAIB’s safety advice into practice, strengthening the performance of sensor equipment where necessary,The board’s preliminary examination into the derailment found that a drainage channel was unable to cope with the amount of water after the rain, causing the earth in the cutting below to become saturated, leading to a landslip,The UK’s worst rail accident in the past two decades occurred followed a similar landslide after rain at Stonehaven in Aberdeenshire, Scotland, where three people died after a train came off the tracks in 2020.
Network Rail has increased expenditure on stabilising and monitoring its tracks and earthworks in the face of extreme weather and the climate crisis.Netowrk Rail said it had committed to spend almost £100m over the next four years on earthworks and drainage in north-west England to ensure the railway’s safety in adverse weather.
Why is Truth Social owner Trump Media merging with a fusion energy firm?
Trump Media & Technology Group, owner of Donald Trump’s social media platform, Truth Social, announced a merger on Wednesday with a company developing fusion energy technology.TAE Technologies, an energy company founded in 1998, will join with Trump Media via a $6bn merger that it promises will propel it to build “the world’s first utility-scale fusion power plant” next year.The move signals that the president and his family continue to look for profit-seeking ventures outside of Truth Social, which remains tiny compared with rival platforms such as Facebook, Instagram and X (formerly Twitter).Here is what we know about the deal so far.The media company, which has dabbled in financial services, is engineering a huge pivot and diving headfirst into nuclear energy
FTSE 100 closes near record high as Santa Rally builds, despite weak retail sales – as it happened
British retailers have suffered a slump in sales in the run-up to Christmas, and are gloomier about their prospects for the start of 2026, a new survey shows.In another sign that the UK economy is struggling, the Confederation of British Industry has reported that retail sales volumes fell at an accelerated rate in the year to December.This pulled the CBI’s gauge of how retail sales compared with a year earlier worsened to -44 in December from -32 in November.The new year is expected to start on a gloomy note for the retail sector. Retailers anticipate that annual sales will fall sharply next month, with expectations at their weakest since March 2021
Elon Musk’s massive 2018 Tesla pay package restored by Delaware court
Elon Musk’s controversial $56bn pay package from Tesla was reinstated by the Delaware supreme court on Friday, two years after a lower court struck down the vast compensation deal as “unfathomable”.The reinstated pay package could be worth as much as $139bn today, according to the New York Times. The decision comes less than two months after Tesla shareholders approved a new plan that could be worth $1tn to Musk, already the world’s richest person, in a decade’s time. Musk’s fortune currently stands at an estimated $600bn.Rescinding the pay deal would be “inequitable”, and would leave Musk “uncompensated for his time and efforts over a period of six years”, the Delaware supreme court justices wrote, echoing arguments from Tesla board members earlier this year
‘A black hole’: families and police say tech giants delay investigations in child abuse and drug cases
Max Osterman was 18 when he connected with a drug dealer on Snapchat who used the handle skyhigh.303. Max would message him whenever he wanted to buy Percocet, and they would meet. After about a year, and just days after their last exchange, Max collapsed. The pills he ordered had been laced with fentanyl
Australia v England: Ashes third Test, day four – live
72nd over: Australia 304-4 (Head 165, Carey 61) But there goes the pressure valve, as Head flays two four off Carse with wolfish abandon. Thirteen from the over, and the lead creeps towards 400.71st over: Australia 291-4 (Head 154, Carey 60) Just a couple off Stokes’s over, who is once again leading by example. It must be exhausting.70th over: Australia 289-4 (Head 153, Carey 59) Head hadn’t looked quite so on it this morning, but now upper cuts with a swagger off Carse to bring a to bring up his 150 off 205 balls
‘They like a good night out’: German darts fans find a (mostly) friendly rivalry at Alexandra Palace
They walk among us, sit among us, sing among us. They speak perfect English, hunt in packs, down industrial quantities of Amstel just like everyone else. And yet to the trained eye, to the seasoned Ally Pally veteran, there is just something different to them. A comportment and a vibe. Perhaps the fact they speak perfect English
TikTok signs Trump-backed deal to avoid US ban
What will your life look like in 2035?
AI boom has caused same CO2 emissions in 2025 as New York City, report claims
Third of UK citizens have used AI for emotional support, research reveals
From Nvidia to OpenAI, Silicon Valley woos Westminster as ex-politicians take tech firm roles
Hackers access Pornhub’s premium users’ viewing habits and search history