Selby Rail Crash Driver Blames "Fate".

chasm

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2011/feb/28/selby-rail-crash-driver-fate

He told Real Radio in his first extended interview since the crash: "I believe in fate and I was meant to be there that morning. The accident occurred because I was there. The same for the people that were on the train. They were meant to be there that morning.

"As far as being asleep at the wheel, that's what I went to prison for. It's not what the truth is. No deaths occurred at the point of impact with my Land Rover. They all occurred 700 yards down the track which I feel other people should have been held accountable for, so in my own head I've dealt with it in that fashion."


So 10 years on and still no acceptance of blame, it must make it hard for the families of victims to forgive him as he seems to show no real feeling at all imo.

Denial is a river in Egypt, and he is in it. He obviously doesn't lose any sleep over being the cause of those deaths as he has "separated" himself from it!

seamus

He has a point to a certain extent in that his error was only one of a number of errors which gave rise to the incident.

However, his is pretty much the only error that if it had not occured, the crash would not have occured.

Pretty bizarre that he doesn't link the collision with his vehicle to the deaths. Cause and effect, no, Mr Hart?

WindSock

Probably some messed up coping mechanism.

Captain_Generic

What an idiot, it's like blaming the bullets in a gun instead of the person pulling the trigger

ebixa82

Deleted User wrote: »

Denial is a river in Egypt, and he is in it. He obviously doesn't lose any sleep over being the cause of those deaths as he has "separated" himself from it!

Cringe

Sykk

Hope he got a good dickin' in jail.

dj jarvis

well sorry to say he has a point about other also being to blame ,
dont know if you have noticed but since that crash ALL railway bridges
that have public roads near or crossing them now (or will have ) armco crash barriers being installed
i have seen so many in place in recent years , and many many more are being installed
funny all this happens AFTER this crash , should these barriers have been install prior to the crash ? YES , but due to the negligence of the railway authority's and the NRA they were not
another case of shutting the gate after the horse has bolted
would this crash have happened if the barriers were installed ? prob not
would this crash have happened if he had pulled over and rested like he should have NO

A Dub in Glasgo

seamus wrote: »

He has a point to a certain extent in that his error was only one of a number of errors which gave rise to the incident.

What are the other errors?

A Dub in Glasgo

A Dub in Glasgo wrote: »

What are the other errors?

No Armco barriers beside the road approaching the bridge, until this accident the risks of this type of thing happening was considered too low to make taking the remedial action required to prevent it happening.

Sad fact of life, most safety measures happen after loss of life.

A Dub in Glasgo

That is a disgusting interview with the only person responsible for the deaths of 10 people. He should hang his head in shame with the nonsense he has spouted.

A Dub in Glasgo

Deleted User wrote: »

No Armco barriers beside the road approaching the bridge, until this accident the risks of this type of thing happening was considered too low to make taking the remedial action required to prevent it happening.

Sad fact of life, most safety measures happen after loss of life.

How can that be an error? Are we to pay for cocooning the roadways just in case an incompetent or reckless driver goes off the road?

I know that most things get changed after accidents as the root cause is investigated and eliminated or done to ALARP

Trog

He should probably apologize for the sake of the families, and for his own PR purposes, but there is a valid point here. It's not that he somehow loses responsibility because there were no barriers though, that's silly.

He made a mistake by falling asleep at the wheel, and there were devastating consequences. He served a prison sentence for this. He has clearly disassociated himself from the consequences of his mistake, which is understandable, I mean, I couldn't live with the guilt of causing deaths like that. Especially when that's coupled with the fact that he didn't actually decide to kill anyone, but made a less obviously bad mistake, and is now responsible for their deaths.
After paying back his debt to society, which he has, I don't think we should give him such a hard time. I mean he's terrible at managing his own reputation, clearly, and he should apologize, but other than that what more can he do than serve his sentence and deal with his guilt as much as he can?

A Dub in Glasgo

A Dub in Glasgo wrote: »

How can that be an error? Are we to pay for cocooning the roadways just in case an incompetent or reckless driver goes off the road?

I know that most things get changed after accidents as the root cause is investigated and eliminated or done to ALARP

I don't consider not having those barriers in place an error either, but it was one of the recommendations of the report and was not that difficult but expensive to implement.

The root cause was a dozy driver, no amount of safety features could have prevented him from crashing somewhere else instead.