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Tuesday • november 26 • 2013
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INSIDE THIS WEEK: PG 20-21
VOL 25 • NO.46
Community cleanup
Protests at local beaches Campaigners against plans to drill for oil 100km of the Raglan Coast attracted banners and signs at local beaches.
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Raeleene Stenklev-Gussey, Holly Laurence, Geneivre Stenklev-Gussey and Viv StenklevGussey were part of the community effort to pluck mangroves at Sandspit on Saturday. More pictures page17.
Round win for Cory Local racer Cory Holmes had a top day at Pukekohe in the Formula PAGE Firsts, recording not only a race win, but the overall Round title.
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Fabulously floral Waiuku’s St Andrews Centre played host to some stunning PAGE flowers on the weekend, including this one - actually made of icing!
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YES, PAINLESS DENTAL CARE
That's the promise we make in 2013 at FRANKLIN DENTAL - here to serve you!
The Franklin Dental Centre
203 KING STREET, PUKEKOHE A/HRS 235 7409
Ph 238 9656
Call in & compare our fees You’ll be very pleased you did!
No food for 15 hours before Pukekohe train near-miss
Two years on, the Transport Accident Investigation Commission has released a report into an incident in which a Hi-Rail vehicle was nearly struck by a passenger train near Pukekohe. The investigation, released on Thursday, revealed three safety issues that it says contributed to the incident, one of which was that the train controller had not eaten for 15 hours and his performance may have been hampered by low blood glucose levels. On 28 November 2011 a track maintenance gang arrived at the Crown Road level crossing near Paerata to relocate an 11-tonne hirail excavator from there to Pukekohe Station Yard about 5 kilometres away. A scheduled passenger train with seven people on board was due to pass through the
Crown Road level crossing on its way to Pukekohe. The train controller had authorised an unscheduled “training shuttle” train to proceed to Pukekohe several minutes ahead of the scheduled passenger train. The training shuttle looked just like the scheduled passenger train. Several minutes after the training shuttle had passed over the Crown Road level crossing, the person-in-charge of the track maintenance gang radioed the train controller and told him that “a subby [which was meant to be a reference to the scheduled suburban passenger train] had just gone past” and he requested track time to take the hi-rail excavator to Paerata. The train controller assumed that the person-in-charge was referring to the passenger
train and, without checking, authorised him to place a hi-rail vehicle and the hi-rail excavator on the tracks in front of the approaching passenger train. A short time later the train controller noticed the passenger train appear on his mimic screen and realised his error. He alerted the person-in-charge, who managed to get the hi-rail vehicle clear of the track just seconds before the passenger train passed, narrowly avoiding a collision. The train controller’s mistake was failing to check the whereabouts of the passenger train. He did not make that check, because he made an assumption based on the person-incharge of the worksite saying a “subby” had just passed his location. Continued on page 3.
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