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Rescue Jacks

Self lifting train to enable extraction of 'One-unders'
  [vote for,

In the average year there are 26 non staff fatalities on the London Underground and the vast majority of these are caused by the train running over someone (called a One Under). Not all one unders result in fatailites (about 10%) but extended rescue times are a major factor in the death toll as usually the train has to be either driven from on top of the victim or lifted to free them.

Driving the train off requires that someone stays with the victim whilst the train is moved, thus placing them at risk too.

If the train has to be lifted, specialist jacks must be brought in and then deployed. These usually only lift the train by 3-4 inches, not providing much room to release the victim.

A more useful situation would be if the trains had built in jacks and could lift themselves off the track, much in the manner that is used in Touring car motor racing.

As well as being useful for rescue, this could be used for maintenance too.

oneoffdave, Apr 23 2004

Fatality stats for London Underground http://www.hse.gov....s/underground02.pdf
Breakdown by victim class, rather than cause [oneoffdave, Oct 05 2004, last modified Oct 17 2004]

Tube Murder attempt http://news.bbc.co..../london/3595053.stm
News story relating to attempted murder by train [oneoffdave, Oct 05 2004, last modified Oct 17 2004]

Wrong kind of Air Pressure http://www.ananova....?menu=news.quirkies
British transport at its finest [oneoffdave, Oct 05 2004, last modified Oct 17 2004]


       Or people could stay off the tracks...
MikeOliver, Apr 23 2004

       Most of these one-unders are suicides, I understand, so it's a shame that others are put at risk. Wouldn’t it better, then, if the train had some sort of special bumper up front (like a scythe) so that the one-under would be instantly converted into a two-under, and then there would be no point in stopping at all, would there?
ldischler, Apr 23 2004

       In 02/03 48% of the fatalities were suicides [link] so not everyone is on the tracks by choice. If memory serves, there has been at least one murder by pushing someone in front of a train [2nd link].
oneoffdave, Apr 23 2004

       Good idea Dave can even guess what you were watching on TV last night. Trauma by any chance?   

       assuming that i have to now say bad idea anything that technical on British Trains will fail, or take so long to implement that the rest of the world will be using maglev or somesuch system by the time its fitted.   

       overall though +1
engineer1, Apr 23 2004

       Got it spot on [engineer1]. I know that is is foolishly optimistic of me to expect such an idea to work when even changes in air pressure will halt UK trains.
oneoffdave, Apr 23 2004

       Hah, air pressure stops them! Well, that compares favorably to North Korean trains, which require another train of exactly the opposite momentum to effect a reliable stop.
ldischler, Apr 23 2004

       This was also partly inspired by footage of an incident in San Francisco in which a teenager who had been run over by a tram/light rail vehicle was trapped by her foot under the vehicle for 2+ hours whilst it was raised.
oneoffdave, Apr 23 2004


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