“I remember the eeriness of the scene above ground as I walked from my bus to Bart’s Hospital. There were so many emergency vehicles but almost total silence.” Jennifer Osman
Fifty years ago, on February 28, 1975, a catastrophic underground train crash occurred at Moorgate Tube Station, a short distance from Barts Hospital. At 8:46 during the London rush hour, a train on the Northern City Line carrying approximately 300 passengers failed to stop at Moorgate’s southern terminus, crashing into a wall. Sadly, 43 people were killed and 79 injured in what is the worst peacetime incident on the London Underground. Fifty years later, nursing staff who were on duty at the time recall what happened at Barts.
Major Incident Declared
St Bartholomew’s Hospital is the nearest major hospital to Moorgate and was one of three hospitals involved, the others being the Royal London and Guy’s. Barts Hospital was alerted, and a major incident was declared. At the time, all the emergency doctors remained in the hospital to receive casualties, and the non-emergency surgeons travelled to the scene. Alison Knapp recalled what happened:
“At the time, Glyn Evans was a senior registrar in gynaecology. In the major incident plan, a gynaecologist would attend the incident and take on the role of Site Medical Officer. Having assessed the situation, he would then send for surgeons and anaesthetists. Medical teams from other specialities remained at Barts to receive casualties.”
While a medical team were sent to the crash site, other critical preparations took place around the hospital to free up beds and operating theatres. Elective operating lists were cancelled, experienced staff were called in, and patients able to leave were sent home. Catherine Acaster was a newly qualified staff nurse on the morning of the accident.
“In my first six months as a staff nurse on Henry Butlin ward, I was asked to go to Vickery ward that morning to take charge as their staff nurse was off sick. It was all very quiet at first; then, I got a call saying a train had gone into the buffers at Moorgate. It would be necessary to transfer as many patients out of ICU and Cardio-thoracic HDU, most to Vickery. Suddenly, a quiet morning turned into a mad dash to get as many of those going home ready as soon as possible to free up beds. Sister came in early and found me poised to take out a patient’s pacing wires (something I’d never done before). She tactfully took over, saying, “There, you’ll know how to do it next time”. (Catherine Acaster set 1)
Patients soon arrived at Barts’s accident and emergency department, where they were triaged and treated according to the severity of their injuries.
“I remember the people in A&E were covered in soot, which removed their distinguishing features. It was like a scene from a film. It felt unreal.” Kate Clarkson
The soot was an vivid memory for several nurses. Diane Cowling Franklin was moved to the ward receiving patients.
“I remember it well too. I was a student nurse at the time and was pulled from the neurosurgical floor, W.G.Grace, where I had heard loads of ambulances going by. I was then sent to Bowlby Ward, which had been emptied so casualties could be placed there. I was kept busy for the rest of the day taking observations and washing them, as they were all covered in soot. There were many cuts and broken bones. The stories I heard that day from the survivors were chilling. One man told me he always sat in the first carriage, but that day, he was late and had to get in one further back. He felt so lucky to be alive. Later, I was working on the ward where a 19-year-old Woman Police Constable was recovering after having to have her foot amputated in order to be removed from the wreckage. It was a very sad day.”
Gilly Hewetson was a third-year student nurse at the time and was about to go on a late shift when she was asked to do night duty in a female surgical ward where the accident victims were being nursed.
“We kept going nonstop all night, and I remember the ward being very well-staffed with lots of sisters. Patients were going to and from the operating theatres all night long. We had to keep the lights on all night because people thought they were still in the tunnel. And we were continually changing the bed sheets because the patients were covered in soot- it was just coming off them.
“Then, in the morning, when we were about to go off duty, we went into the sluice. The room was packed from floor to ceiling with flowers from some of the City Guilds. They were beautiful, but it took us ages to sort them out as there were so many.”
Continuous Nursing Care
In the 1970s, Barts was a major London teaching hospital with rotating sets of student nurses. Instead of today’s degree-led nursing at university, most of the training, teaching and practical experiences were ward-based. Students were a large part of the nursing workforce and not as supernumerary as they are today. Most were aged between their late teens and early twenties. For some, the age of the patients was strikingly similar to their own.
“I remember being very concerned that one of the youngest and worst hurt of the victims was not only about my own age but shared the same name of the person that my cousin was about to marry. Fortunately, I was on theatre placement and discovered pretty soon that it was pure coincidence.” Rosemary Campbell
Nicky Marks was a student nurse during the crash, so she was involved in the hands-on care of people injured at Moorgate.
“It was a time which is very vivid in my memory. I was the most junior staff member on the ward at the time, and felt separate from all the buzz of the VIP visitors and Prince Charles, but he never came to our ward. I remember that I felt close to the patients and the need to care for them. Some of them got upset by keep having to go over what happened. I could listen and get them a cup of tea.
“They initially put all the patients on one ward and then triaged them to various wards in the hospital. I was on orthopaedics so we received several patients. As a student nurse, I was involved in the basic nursing care. There were quite a few dignitaries visiting the patients, and the senior staff were involved with those, but as students, we provided a lot of hands-on patient care. For example, each morning, all the patients had to have their hair washed in bed as they were covered in soot. We got a good system going with plastic sheets and a type of drain so water didn’t get on the bed sheets. And in those days, every ward had a hairdryer and a set of Carmen heated roller curlers.”
“One of the funny things that happened was a young chap was admitted, and his clothes were sent to the laundry. Well, someone must have put his clothes in the boil wash because everything that returned had shrunk.”
Care at Barts continued for weeks and months as patients required complex treatment and rehabilitation. Newly qualified staff nurse Shelagh Phelps recalled one patient’s care in particular.
“I was newly qualified and working as a Staff Nurse with Sister Miss Reid and her team in the Cardiothoracic Theatre on the top floor of ‘The New Block ~ Queen Elizabeth Building’ in Bartholomew Close. Our days were busy and long, but it was a wonderful environment for my first Staff Nurse job and with a great deal of technical learning. Sometime after the disaster on February 28th 1975, we acquired a new addition to our daily list at the end of each day. The young woman was a patient in Vicary Ward, ICU, on the floor below us and had had her foot amputated in the tunnel to extract her from the train. Both she and a man were crushed together in the front of the first carriage, and it wasn’t until late evening they managed to get them out. The man died in hospital a month later. However, the lady required her dressings to be changed daily, and these were considered too painful and traumatic for her to be undertaken on the ward, so she would come up to us for a light and quick anaesthetic and dressing change, performed, I think, by her team from ICU.
Moorgate Protection at Moorgate Station
After the Crash
Although the emergency services’ actions saved many lives that day, questions remained about the cause of the accident. A public enquiry into the Moorgate disaster was inconclusive.
Several safety changes were made as a result of learning from the incident. One of these is the Moorgate Protection, the name given to speed controls at the entry to stations, introduced in 1978. The emergency brake is automatically applied if a train passes checkpoints at more than 12mph. The signalling approach to stations was also changed to a safer solution after Moorgate.
Historically, the least specialist surgical doctor was sent to major emergencies, as happened at Moorgate. However, surgical training has changed significantly in Britain. Trauma care is included in the syllabus of all surgical speciality training during the seven years. Trauma networks are now in place across the United Kingdom.
There are two memorials to the Moorgate Tube Disaster. One was erected in Finsbury Square in 2013, and another was unveiled in 2014 on the side of the Moorgate building at Moor Place. Many of the Barts nurses on duty at the time of the accident continue to think of those they nursed from Moorgate to this day.
Author: Rachael Rowe. Copyright @The League of St Bartholomew’s Nurses. Photo sources: Alamy and Rachael Rowe. All enquiries: info@bartsleagueofnurses.org
