An unusual situation at the railway crossing at Tuszyńska Street in Łódź. A freight train stopped just before the toll gate. His locomotive could not go any further because the wheels were slipping on the rails due to the rain. The situation lasted for several minutes and during that time there was a huge traffic jam on the street. According to a representative of LTG Cargo, the cause of the incident was a failure of traffic control devices at the Łódź-Chojny station. In turn, PKP PLK assures that there was no fault and that the train was stuck before crossing due to “technical problems of the locomotive”.
This unusual event took place on November 14, at the railway crossing at Tuszyńska Street in Łódź. The LDZ Motoryzowani Łodzianie profile published a recording of one of the residents, showing a freight train standing in front of the crossing. On Tuszyńska Street – as you can see in the video – there was a long traffic jam. “The crossing on Tuszyńska Street is blocked, the train can't arrive. They had wheels and it can't move, and it's full of containers,” wrote the profile of LDZ Motorized Łodzianie.
“Traffic control devices fault”
We asked the LTG Cargo company, which owns the train, about the events. As Traction Director Paweł Żółtak described the event in an interview with tvn24.pl, it all started with a failure of the traffic control devices at the Łódź-Chojny station, where – as our interlocutor explained – they could not display the correct semaphore. – If this had happened, as stated in the regulation, then the train would have entered this crossing from a running start, and in this case it would have had to slow down and stop – he said. He added that a so-called substitute signal was displayed, which lights up only for several dozen seconds and then turns into red light. – Due to difficult weather conditions, the train did not manage to arrive in time for this signal, the driver had to slow down, the dispatcher showed him the replacement signal again and, unfortunately, due to the slope and the curve, the train got stuck before crossing. The wheels of the locomotive began to slip due to the rain. The locomotive stopped and we had to wait for help from another locomotive, which arrived after a dozen or so minutes and managed to move on, he said. – It's worth asking PKP PLK, why the crossing was not opened. They knew that the train had no chance of moving, they saw it on the cameras, that the train was standing in front of the crossing and they could have opened the crossing to let the cars pass. Everything is done in consultation with radio communications, it's hard for me to say why PKP didn't do it – he summed up.
The incident occurred at a railway crossing at Tuszyńska Street in ŁódźLDZ Motorized People of Łódź
“There was no fault”
We asked PKP Polskie Linie Kolejowe to comment on the incident. Rafał Wilgusiak from the press office reported that there was no fault at the Łódź-Chojny station on the fateful evening. – There was no failure of traffic control devices on the Łódź Kaliska-Łódź Chojny route, as well as at the Łódź Chojny station. Traffic on this route is carried on one track at a time due to planned works being carried out on the adjacent track. Therefore, trains run in the opposite direction to the main direction (i.e. on one track) and at the Łódź Chojny station they are accepted at the so-called replacement signal – he informed. He added that “an LTG Cargo freight train weighing over 1,500 tons got stuck at a rail-road crossing on Tuszyńska Street in Łódź due to technical problems with the locomotive.” – All crossing devices on Tuszyńska Street worked and are working efficiently. Safety reasons do not allow opening the barriers when the train is between the barriers or in their immediate vicinity. Additionally, the driver tried to pass the train through the crossing. For this reason, raising dams was absolutely prohibited. For PLK SA, the most important thing is the safety of rail, road and pedestrian traffic participants – summed up Rafał Wilgusiak from PKP PLK.
Main photo source: LDZ Motorized People of Łódź