The railway expands the inspection of thousands of concrete sleepers. A further 130,000 components are to be checked nationwide, as the group announced on Tuesday. Passengers have to be prepared for restrictions, for example when thresholds are replaced.
When checking 200,000 sleepers of a certain type and manufacturer in the summer, “irregularities in the material properties” were noticed. As a railway spokeswoman has now announced, around 137,000 of these sleepers have to be replaced. By the end of the year, almost all affected routes should be open to traffic again. “In some cases, however, the replacement of the sleepers will continue into the coming year.”
After the train accident in Garmisch-Patenkirchen
The new components to be examined are sleepers from other manufacturers that have been processed with the same type of rock. If the experts discover any abnormalities, the corresponding sleepers will be swapped according to the railway. “Until the affected sleepers are replaced, trains will then run more slowly in the relevant sections.” The group announced that there could also be blockages. The affected thresholds are installed nationwide, but primarily in Saxony, Saxony-Anhalt and Thuringia.
The trigger for the summer inspection was an accident in Garmisch-Patenkirchen at the beginning of June, in which a regional train derailed. Four people died. According to the railway, the components then checked were the same type of construction as on the section of the train that had an accident. Conclusions about the cause of the accident in Upper Bavaria could not be drawn from the inspection findings, it said in the summer.
