Rail authorities believe Friday's accident at the suburban station, about 20 kilometers north of London, was caused when the train passed over a faulty set of points - a switching mechanism that diverts trains onto different tracks.
Rail authorities believe that nuts securing one set of points became detached, causing the points to move as the train passed over them.
The Mirror newspaper quoted rail union bosses as saying that workers had raised repeated concerns about track problems in the area only a few miles away from Hatfield, the scene of another fatal derailment in 2000, which was caused by a broken rail.
Railtransport is the transport of passengers and goods by means of wheeled vehicles specially designed to run along railways (sometimes known as railroads).
The rails and perpendicular beams are usually then placed on a foundation made of concrete or compressed earth and gravel in a bed of ballast to prevent the track from buckling (bending out of its original configuration) as the ground settles over time beneath and under the weight of the vehicles passing above.
Railsmay be composed of segments welded or bolted, and may be of a length comparable to that of a railcar or two or may be many hundreds of feet long.
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