Heavy drinkers will appear sober, despite having way more alcohol in their system than the average person.

"You do seem to have crashed your train there, old chap. Why dont you come on over for a nice cuppa?". Most English thing ever.

How strange that less than 2 months later, another non-fatal crash occurred at Tattenham Corner which was also due to driver intoxication.

As a former driver there was a big drink culture throughout the rail industry. I could tell many anecdotes 😂

Another consideration is the whole thing about relief freight drivers.   My uncle was a 33 driver based at Hoo, unlike passenger drivers who learn a single set route, freight drivers had to have perfect knowledge of hundreds of miles of route and to pass out they have to evidence thorough and total knowledge of every foot of the line from start to end.   Dover to Willesden is one heck of a long long route to be master of, driver has to know every marker, every signal, every hill and drop, every speed change limit.   Now add that into driver having to know not just that one but say 20 or more routes, all perfect down to the nearest foot, every single aspect he has to be master of.   My uncle often took the Sheerness to Willesden Ford trains, he operated about 20 different routes from Northfleet cements to various places, to Queensborough glass and steel trains to different places and every week he was poring over his pastel rule books issued by BR for the lines he ran.  This never reaches the papers of course but BR was squeezing drivers for every ounce of work possible, so the drivers become overextended, suffering from exhaustion and other problems and some do turn to drink to help sleep.   No excuse but people think bloke jumps into a cab and its all an awayday til he reaches end and what a cushy job etc etc.

As a functional alcoholic whose surname is also Barnes, I don't think it would be unreasonable to breathalyse train drivers as they go on duty. The consequences absolutely justify the risk management control.

I'm so pleased that nobody was killed or seriously injured.  So lucky

Maidstone East was just under a mile from where I lived back then. The window of my house were open that night,,, I was woken by the sound of a huge crash. I knew that what ever had made tremendous noise would be on the news the next day.
I cycled to work that morning past Maidstone East and a railway wagon sticking up over the roof of the station... Yep that would be what had made that huge crash!

Good afternoon Tom and everyone, I'm looking forward to watching this video. I'm wrapped up in a throw, recovering from a bad cold/flu. Very petty not letting you film there or take pictures.

In the 70's my father often worked both the Maidstone signal boxes, he didn't like East as the running speed restrictions were always a problem with drivers and he offered those words to the investigation back in 93.   Thing about AWS is BR didn't want to pay for the extra's, AWS could be utilised to enforce speed using magnets to let engine know what the speed restriction was and could even be made to force braking but BR left it to the simple sunflower and button press...   TPMS is what AWS should have been, you go through a TPMS grid over speed and the train gets red nosed and a 5 minute carpeting by the traction manager to come, if your train was excessively running fast through a TPMS you got the full anchors out braking and likely end of your career sort of talking to.   The other thing is the SR was built for SR units, a 47 has a larger routing requirement than a 73 or 33, its a big express locomotive having six axles and a lot more presence on the line, the loco should have been slowed down a lot more a lot sooner simply as its bigger than what the line was built for.   Its a great loco on the mainlines north of London or out west but the SR was used to littler loco's, more slender trains and the reason you rarely saw 37s on the SR was because of that routing requirement, the 37 and similar were just not good players on SR metals.

Very lucky it didn't happen when the station was busy.

Fantastic work as ever Tom, your reporting is always just the right tone, very informative and with the respect deserved. Many thanks!

i worked  at waterloo as a electrians mate, used to go to the club at night for a drink, and see drivers knocking it back   terrible

The nearby industrial building that distracted the signal box operator is the former Tilling Stevens Works just over the river. Until 1975 this building built car components for the Rootes group. By 1993 it had been broken down to small workshops, I've walked past it many times and never experienced  continuous loud noise. I suspect there may have been an alternative reason why the signal box operator did not hear a major train crash immediately outside his signal box.
The railway employee social club was just over the river by the foot entrance to the High Level Bridge, opposite Tilling Stevens, there is another railway employee social club at West Station a 2 minute walk away. Railway employees appear to have been very sociable.

Very professionally presented. Your measured speech greatly helps the understanding of events.

As a Maidstone resident and drinker in a nearby pub on the time of this occasion I have some information you would like about this accident.

Another one of your excellent videos.  Steady and detailed telling of a truly scary incident.  Also. nice little pic of a Melbourne Comeng EMU showing the TPWS system.  I didn't realise we were so up to date 😊👍.

I must have been in early hibernation in September 1993:  I was living in a village 6 miles outside Maidstone and I have absolutely no recollection of this being in the news.
Thanks for telling this story; I'm sorry you were thrown out of the station for filming; I'm very glad no-one lost life or limb; the station looks smart and crisp and still in character with the original; and what happened to the driver afterwards?  Did he go on to be able to hold down a job, or did he vanish into a sad, difficult obscurity, I wonder?

Also brought into question the way drivers were supervised i.e. signing on

This one seems sketchy, like they are trying to hide something!