RYDE REOPENS: Train services finally returned to the Isle of Wight’s Island Line on November 1, almost 10 months after it closed for upgrades and seven months after it was originally planned to reopen due to delays with the engineering work and commissioning the new fleet of five two-car Class 484 third-rail Vivarail EMUs. Infrastructure improvements on the eight-and-a-half-mile line between Ryde and Shanklin include a new passing loop at Brading that will allow a 30-minute service frequency, although only one train an hour is expected to run until spring 2022. No. 484001 is pictured on Ryde Pier on November 3.
CHRIS WILSON
FOURTEEN passengers were injured and needed hospital treatment, and a train driver suffered life-changing injuries in a collision between two trains at the entrance to Fisherton Tunnel, Salisbury, on October 31.
The collision involved the 1F30/17.08 Portsmouth Harbour-Bristol Temple Meads formed of Class 158 Nos. 158763 and South Western Railway Class 159 No. 159102 working the 1L53/17.20 Waterloo-Honiton.
The Portsmouth train was signalled off the line from Eastleigh at Tunnel Junction, east of Salisbury, where it joins the LSW main line from Waterloo. Open access information shows 1F30 was running around 19 minutes late.