Pécrot rail crash
The Pécrot rail crash was a rail accident in Belgium. It occurred on March 27, 2001.
Timeline of events
- 8:41 - In Wavre station, a signalman noticed an empty passenger train departing from track 4 towards Leuven, against a red signal.
- 8:42 - The Wavre signalman contacted the Leuven signalman, to inform him about the train. However, the Wavre signalman spoke French while the Leuven signalman spoke Flemish, so the Leuven signalman did not understand the message fully.
- 8:43 - The Wavre signalman tried to have the overhead wire current cut off on the erroneously departed train's track. However, that could not be done from Wavre. The signalman therefore contacted a controller in Brussels about the problem.
- 8:46 - The Brussels controller tried to contact the driver of the train, but was unable to reach him. The Brussels controller also tried to contact the driver of a passenger train that had just departed from Leuven towards Wavre, traveling on the same track as the other train, in the opposite direction. Again, the controller failed to reach the driver.
- 8:47 - The overhead wire current was cut off, automatically engaging the emergency brakes of both trains, but too late.
- 8:50 - A head-on collision was reported in the village of Pécrot. Eight people were killed (including both drivers), and twelve injured.
Cause
There were two main causes of this accident. The first was the inexperience of the driver of the train which departed from Wavre. The train had stopped with the driver's cab past the signal, so the driver could not see that the signal was red when he departed. The other cause was the language barrier between the station staff at Wavre and Leuven. Both French and Flemish are official languages in Belgium and rail staff were only required to speak one. NMBS/SNCB, the Belgian national railway company, admitted that the accident was caused solely by human error.