The driver killed in the train crash near Bedford has been named as Shaun Burton, as authorities continue the investigation into the fatal incident that left 100 people injured.
The 60-year-old died when the East Midlands Railway (EMR) train he was driving crashed into the back of another on the same line shortly after 5pm on Friday. In a tribute issued by British Transport Police (BTP), his family said: “We are devastated by his loss. Our thoughts are also with those affected by this incident.”
Dave Calfe, general secretary of Aslef, the train drivers’ union, said: “We are all heartbroken by the death of Shaun Burton which leaves a hole in the lives of his family, friends, and colleagues, which will never be filled. Shaun, a driver at East Midlands Railway, joined the railway relatively late in life.
“He loved public transport – he used to work on buses and coaches – before he became a train driver seven years ago.”
The naming of Mr Burton comes as the probe continues into how the Luton Airport Express train smashed into the back of another EMR train on Friday, at around 5pm. On Sunday, Network Rail called the crash a “tragic, isolated incident”, as it launched a major operation to minimise significant disruption expected on the rail lines.
Rail disruption is set to continue until 28 June, as a “complex recovery operation” to remove the damaged trains and carriages from the railway gets underway, the company said.
“While investigations are still at an early stage, current indications are that this was a tragic, isolated incident,” Ellie Burrows, Network Rail Eastern regional managing director, said on Sunday.
Nine people remained in a critical condition as of Saturday afternoon, the East of England Ambulance Service said. Another 32 were seriously injured while 57 people suffered minor injuries.
With the probe ongoing and recovery efforts set to take a minimum of several days, rail passengers have been urged to travel to and from Bedford only if it is “absolutely necessary”.
There will be no services north of Luton on the busy commuter Thameslink line and no EMR services south of Bedford, with a limited rail replacement bus service running between Luton and Bedford, Network Rail said.
The ongoing investigation into what caused the Bedford train crash, led by the Rail Accident Investigation Branch, is expected to look into signal failures and the possibility of human error, an expert has said.
Investigators will look at the black box data from both trains, along with CCTV and available signalling information.
“I think it comes down to human error or a system fault, or some kind of interaction from the environment outside … It’s very hard to tell [what happened],” railway systems consultant Peter Hicks told The Times on Sunday.
“They [the investigators] will get downloads from the systems on the trains to say what inputs the drivers gave, and outputs from the signalling system. And they will be the ones who can say what the root cause and what the contributory causes were.”
Travel expert Simon Calder told Sky News that the train in front had come to a halt “because of a problem with the automatic warning system which warns train drivers if there is a red signal ahead”.
On Saturday, RAIB said its inspectors were still gathering evidence at the scene, and said it would provide a further update “in the coming days once we know more”.
As part of recovery work, the overhead wires which provide power to electric trains will be removed and a temporary access road will be built for a crane to get close to the railway line.
Two 110-tonne Kirow cranes on the track will then lift the trains and carriages from the line, then a road crane will move them on to a trailer to be taken away by road, before engineers inspect the railway.
This work is expected to take days, during which time no EMR services will run between Bedford and London St Pancras.
Trains that usually start and terminate at London St Pancras will start and terminate at Bedford instead, and there will be a reduced service on some other lines.
From Monday, north of London St Pancras towards Bedford, Thameslink will run a limited service as far as Luton only.
The front of the 4:40pm Friday departure from Corby to London St Pancras was crushed when it crashed into the rear of the 3:50pm departure from Nottingham, to the same destination.
The Corby train also had damage to the rear of the carriages which had been shunted into ones in front.
The crash was the first train collision in the UK in which someone onboard the train died since October 2024, when two trains collided head-on near Powys, Wales.
