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Harrow and Wealdstone rail crash

1952 disasters in the United Kingdom1952 in London20th century in MiddlesexAccidents and incidents involving British RailDisasters in Middlesex
History of the London Borough of HarrowOctober 1952 events in the United KingdomRail accidents caused by a driver's errorRailway accidents and incidents in LondonRailway accidents in 1952Railway accidents involving a signal passed at dangerRailway accidents involving fogTrain collisions in EnglandTransport in the London Borough of HarrowUse British English from August 2013
H&W crash 6
H&W crash 6

The Harrow and Wealdstone rail crash was a three-train collision at Harrow and Wealdstone station in Wealdstone, Middlesex (now Greater London) during the morning rush hour of 8 October 1952. 112 were killed and 340 injured, 88 of these being detained in hospital, and it remains the worst peacetime rail crash in the United Kingdom and the second deadliest overall. The Quintinshill rail disaster of 1915 had 226 fatalities. An overnight express train from Perth crashed into the rear of a local passenger train standing at a platform at the station. The wreckage blocked adjacent lines and was struck within seconds by a "double-headed" express train travelling north at 60 mph (100 km/h). The Ministry of Transport report on the crash found that the driver of the Perth train had passed a caution signal and two danger signals before colliding with the local train. The reason for this was never established, as both the driver and the fireman of the Perth train were killed in the accident. The accident accelerated the introduction of the Automatic Warning System, and British Railways agreed to a five-year plan to install the system to give drivers an in-cab audible and visual warning when nearing a signal at caution, actuated by magnets between the rails.

Excerpt from the Wikipedia article Harrow and Wealdstone rail crash (License: CC BY-SA 3.0, Authors, Images).

Harrow and Wealdstone rail crash
Sandridge Close, London Wealdstone (London Borough of Harrow)

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Latitude Longitude
N 51.592222222222 ° E -0.335 °
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Harrow & Wealdstone

Sandridge Close
HA1 1XD London, Wealdstone (London Borough of Harrow)
England, United Kingdom
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H&W crash 6
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Lower Mead
Lower Mead

Lower Mead was a football stadium in Harrow, North West London. It was the home ground of Wealdstone Football Club for nearly 70 years from 1922 until 1991, after which it was demolished. Construction of the stadium was completed in time for the start of the 1922/23 season, the club having previously played at a number of local grounds. Situated on Station Road, Harrow, at the northern end of Harrow town centre and just south of the district of Wealdstone, the stadium was behind a row of shops and a cinema (today known as the Safari Cinema), and was eventually flanked along its northern perimeter by residential flats built in High Mead in the mid-1930s. The stadium consisted of a small main stand to the south, purchased in 1928 from Summerstown F.C.'s ground in Earlsfield, which contained the players' and officials' dressing rooms and was the only seated part of the stadium, and which straddled the half-way line, with uncovered terracing to either side of it. To the west was a covered terracing known as the Elmslie End, named in honour of a club official. Uncovered terracing ran the entire length of the pitch on the north side, created just after the second world war when the land behind it was sold for housing. To the east was a narrow covered terrace known as the Cinema End. The clubhouse and supporters' bar stood immediately adjacent to the stadium on the southern side. There were minimal car or coach parking facilities.Following financial mismanagement by the then owner of the club, at the end of the 1990/91 season Wealdstone were forced to sell the freehold of Lower Mead to Tesco in order to stay in existence. The company handling the sale of Lower Mead then went into liquidation and, after protracted legal proceedings, the club eventually received only a very small percentage of the sum that Tesco had paid for the site. This left the club not only homeless but also struggling financially for many years, necessitating various groundshare agreements; initially with Watford F.C., followed by Yeading F.C., Edgware Town F.C. and then finally Northwood F.C. before the club finally obtained a permanent home ground of their own in 2008 called Grosvenor Vale, in Ruislip, only 3 miles away from Lower Mead. Demolition of Lower Mead stadium began in June 1991 and a large Tesco supermarket was built on the site, which operates to this day. A decorative weather vane on the roof of the store features a footballing scene, as a memorial of the site's previous use. To commemorate what would have been the centenary of the ground, in 2021 a booklet has been produced by Wealdstone FC supporters which records the growth and development of Lower Mead during its use. It is available from the WFCSC Megastore online.