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Random SPADs 22/03/2019 at 22:10 #116569
9pN1SEAp
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1097 posts
Should we have a tick box to enable (rare) SPADs?

Thanks
Jamie

Jamie S (JAMS)
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Random SPADs 22/03/2019 at 22:19 #116570
GeoffM
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6271 posts
No. Explanation
SimSig Boss
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Random SPADs 22/03/2019 at 22:20 #116571
Trainfan344
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Pretty sure this has been answered before, with several responses of why?! other responses of Simulation unable to do it, amongst others.
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Random SPADs 23/03/2019 at 09:15 #116577
kbarber
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9pN1SEAp in post 116569 said:
Should we have a tick box to enable (rare) SPADs?

Thanks
Jamie
To expand a little on Geoff's response, Firstly SPADs were extremely rare even in pre-TPWS days. I never had one. I never saw one. I was never in a box next to someone who had one. And my experience was pretty-much always in mechanical boxes (OK I did 'visit' the odd panel but there was still enough mechanical kit around in those days, and panels sufficiently difficult to get into, that they were a small minority). In other words, rare isn't enough; the whole of the Simsig community shouldn't see more than a couple of SPADS a year, if that.

But FAR MORE IMPORTANT is what it means for the poor signalman. If you're on a panel and a train SPADs, you have no idea what's going to happen next. But there's a significant likelihood that it will be nasty. Imagine being in Willesden Powerbox as a down stopper overruns the signal at Wembley protecting the Freightliner the box supervisor has just told you to let out. (Worse still, imagine being the Assistant Controller - a posh name for booking boy - and you were the signalman at Gerrards Cross who was responsible for 4 deaths in the Seer Green collision a couple of years before, and you have to just sit there and watch until the whole left-hand end of the panel goes red. Yes, that was what happened on 11th October 1984. And I was on duty in Brent Sidings Yard, about a mile to the south, and as soon as I heard what had happened sent as many staff as I could afford to help in the rescue work.) Or imagine being on duty at Oxted on a foggy morning and you notice a train leaving Ashurst, passing a red signal on the way out, with a down train already on teh single line from Hever, and you can do nothing except tell Control and sit there until the dreaded phone calls start coming through. (Again, it happened - 15th October 1994.)

That is why we don't do SPADS, other than when a signal has been returned to danger in a driver's face.

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The following users said thank you: 9pN1SEAp, Trainfan344, postal, BarryM, flabberdacks, KymriskaDraken
Random SPADs 23/03/2019 at 11:36 #116582
geswedey
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192 posts
RE signals replaced in an emergency.

I was travelling pass (using a cab pass) on Freightliner many years ago when the signal in front was replaced by the signaller, trust me it is nerve wracking when you can't see the line ahead as the there is a curve in advance of you, you are running at 75 mph and you know you can't stop in the distance that you can see and you don't know why the signal has been replaced.

not fun from a driver or train crews perspective either.

Glyn

Glyn Calvert ACIRO
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Random SPADs 25/03/2019 at 10:52 #116686
kbarber
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geswedey in post 116582 said:
RE signals replaced in an emergency.

I was travelling pass (using a cab pass) on Freightliner many years ago when the signal in front was replaced by the signaller, trust me it is nerve wracking when you can't see the line ahead as the there is a curve in advance of you, you are running at 75 mph and you know you can't stop in the distance that you can see and you don't know why the signal has been replaced.

not fun from a driver or train crews perspective either.

Glyn
Indeed. But at least we in the box know there's nowt in the way, and because the driver in Simsig is a computer we know it isn't imagining the possibilities it might be about to run into.

But you're absolutely right Glyn; a signal going back is hardly better than a SPAD for somebody's nerves & mental wellbeing.

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Random SPADs 25/03/2019 at 12:08 #116694
Jan
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888 posts
kbarber in post 116577 said:
That is why we don't do SPADS, other than when a signal has been returned to danger in a driver's face.

Actually at the moment we don't do even that (and neither if a failed track circuit or signal lamp puts back the signal). It might be an idea to handle that with more realistic braking distances, though, as long as e.g. (at a controlled signal) the train continues into the route held by approach locking, which wouldn't pose any safety issues.

Two million people attempt to use Birmingham's magnificent rail network every year, with just over a million of them managing to get further than Smethwick.
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Random SPADs 25/03/2019 at 12:20 #116698
jc92
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Unless it's been removed, there's an option in f11 to make a train overrun a signal and then contact the signaller but it's not random.
"We don't stop camborne wednesdays"
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Random SPADs 25/03/2019 at 16:18 #116717
clive
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2734 posts
Jan in post 116694 said:
kbarber in post 116577 said:
That is why we don't do SPADS, other than when a signal has been returned to danger in a driver's face.

Actually at the moment we don't do even that (and neither if a failed track circuit or signal lamp puts back the signal). It might be an idea to handle that with more realistic braking distances, though, as long as e.g. (at a controlled signal) the train continues into the route held by approach locking, which wouldn't pose any safety issues.
Already in the "to do" list somewhere.

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