IARNRÓD ÉIREANN’S inspection regime for bridges on the rail network is “certain” to change following the findings of investigations into last month’s viaduct collapse near Malahide, Co Dublin, CIÉ chairman John Lynch has said.
Mr Lynch told the Oireachtas Committee on Transport yesterday that CIÉ was “shaken” by what happened, especially as the viaduct over Broadmeadow Estuary had been inspected just four days ahead of the potentially catastrophic incident on August 21st.
Although the inquiry by the Railway Safety Commission’s rail accident investigations unit is confidential and its report probably several months away, Mr Lynch said Iarnród Éireann was already inspecting more than 80 other bridges on the rail network.
“Safety is on the agenda at every single board meeting, it’s the single most important thing, we take safety extremely seriously”, he told TDs and Senators. He also noted that the last rail accident in Ireland involving any fatalities was 26 years ago.
Labour Party transport spokesman Tommy Broughan TD said the viaduct collapse “could have been one of the most horrendous events in the history of our country” with hundreds of lives lost, and “we could have been attending funerals for weeks”.
He accused Iarnród Éireann of “taking a chance” when a decision was made to keep the line open after being alerted by Ivan Barrett, one of the leaders of Malahide Sea Scouts, that there was a serious problem with the viaduct five days before the incident.
However Iarnród Éireann chief executive Dick Fearn said an engineer had carried out an inspection the following day, which found nothing wrong, and that this had been confirmed by a track-monitoring vehicle that reported no “undulations” on this stretch of the line.
It was only afterwards, Mr Fearn said, that a more detailed inspection involving experienced divers had found that the most likely cause of one of the viaducts’s piers collapsing was erosion of the sea-bed causeway supporting the 180-metre-long structure.
Asked why the causeway had not been checked before the incident, Mr Lynch said was “checked in 2006 and cleared and didn’t need to be rechecked until 2012”, in accordance with the current inspection programme. “It’s a mystery why it [the collapse] happened.”
Tributes were paid by committee chairman Frank Fahey TD and other members to train driver Keith Farrelly, who stopped his train just short of the damaged viaduct after spotting the danger ahead.
His alertness was described as “exemplary” and saved many lives.
Mr Fearn repeatedly mentioned the €100 million a year that had been invested since the late 1990s in improving safety on the railway network, including track replacement and the acquisition of “a whole new fleet of trains, designed to best international standards”.
When Fine Gael transport spokesman Fergus O’Dowd TD claimed that the Railway Safety Commission’s budget had been cut by €2 million, Andrew Cullen, assistant secretary of the Department of Transport, said this was being met by a levy on rail operating companies.