Fatal Misinterpretation: The 1967 Langenweddingen Level Crossing Inferno
By: Max S
Tags: Disaster, Tragedy, Germany, Railways, History

The Accident

On the 6th of July at around 7:55am P852 is approaching Langenweddingen station from the east, travelling at approximately 85kph/53mph. On board the train were 540 passengers including 50 children in the chartered first passenger car, travelling to a holiday camp in the Harz mountains organized by their parents’ employer. Holiday camps like these, organized by the companies employing the parents were a common thing in the DDR, allowing the parents to stay at work during the time. The locomotive is staffed with a driver and a stoker, both are experienced at their job. At the same time a tanker truck from the oil-company Minol is approaching the level crossing on the eastern end of the station, headed southbound with a load of 15000l/4000 US gallons (reportedly, 12000l/3170 US gallons is also possible judging from common trucks’ capacity) highly flammable Ligroin for a nearby factory. Due to the angle between the road and tracks of approximately 50° and thick vegetation in the area the truck driver cannot see the tracks to the east of the station. Coming in the opposite direction, having a marginally better view of the tracks, is a trailer-bus with 35 people on board.

Seeing the train approach the dispatcher in the local signalbox orders the barriers to be closed. The crossing guard starts turning the crank to lower the barriers, but one has gotten caught on the sagging telephone lines running elevated alongside the tracks. This is a known issue, and the crossing guard routinely starts to repeatedly raise and lower the barrier a short distance trying to get it untangled. However, this time he is unsuccessful. This all happened in clear view of the dispatcher, who did not think to turn the signal red.

The repaired signal box in 1999, on the northern side of the tracks. The dispatcher looked out the windows on the top right.

A reenactment of the problem, the tip of the barrier is caught on the wire.

The truck driver, who had slowed down when the barriers started to lower, accelerates again. It can only be assumed that he believed the barriers had started to lower erroneously. Spotting the approaching bus and realizing the danger of the situation the dispatcher runs to his window and manages to signal the bus driver with a red flag, stopping the bus a few meters short of the crossing. The tanker truck, however, is in a blind spot and doesn’t stop. Another train is waiting at the station for P852 to pass, when it’s driver realizes what is about to unfold he uses the horn to morse the “immediate stop”-signal, a row of 3 short tones. The signal gets drowned out by the noise of the steam engine. At this point, the collision is unavoidable. The train is approximately 30m/98ft from the crossing when the driver sees the truck crossing into his path. An emergency stop is initiated, but fruitless.

A graphic showing where the tanker truck approached from, the high hedge blocking sight of the dispatcher.

At 8am the locomotive strikes the truck with it’s forward right corner, destroying it on impact. The driver is thrown from the cabin on impact, he dies when he hits the ground alongside the tracks. The trailer swings around and hits the side of the train, breaking several windows. The impact cracks the tank open, the cargo spills onto the train and into the interior. The Ligroin momentarily ignites, turning the forward car into a giant, occupied fireball.

In this explanatory photo you can still see the wreckage of the truck burn in the foreground.

Riding towards the back of the first 4-car set is Mister Bodewell, then 17 years old. When he sees the front of the train go up in flames he jumps out and lands on the beginning platform, surviving with injuries. The stoker manages to unhook the locomotive from the burning train, avoiding a secondary explosion. Burning Ligroin spills out along the track, all the way to the station building. The steam-based heating of the cars is damaged, high-pressure steam carries the liquid even further. Inside the forward cars, the air is most literally on fire. Lacking a locomotive, severely damaged and on fire the train cars roll to a stop in Langenweddingen station, the locomotive stops a few hundred meters further down the tracks. Mister Bodewell remembers hearing screams from inside the train, then spotting a slightly-open door on one of the forward cars. He rips it open, braving the insane heat from the flames (800–1000°C/1500–1830°F). Grabbing a hand extended to him he pulls a mother and her young child from the fiery wreckage, recalling “the child was burning all over”. Using his shirt he extinguishes the flames on the child before turning to try and save more survivors. In his memory most people at the station wasted precious seconds, being understandably shocked by the unfolding inferno. An exemption is Mister Moritz, the headmaster of a school a few towns away. He survives the accident and re-enters the train several times to rescue survivors. 12 students survive thanks to him, he himself succumbs to his injuries from the fire the next day. The clock on the station building, which burns out, stops at 8:06am.

The ruins of the station building.

According to official reports the disaster claims 94 lives, including 44 of the children in the first passenger car. At least 50 people survive with severe injuries (exact numbers are impossible to come by). People on site that day say 140–150 victims is closer to the truth. Either way, 12 victims end up buried in a mass grave, they can not be identified/distinguished.