Belgian pro-safety strike after rail disaster

This video is called Belgian train crash in Halle.

From Xinhua news agency:

Train crash triggers workers’ strike in Belgium

BRUSSELS, Feb. 16 — Belgium railway workers went on strike on Tuesday morning, one day after two passenger trains crashed headon near Brussels that killed at least 18 people and wounded more than 150 others.

The union of the railway workers said the all-out strike aimed to protest the working conditions. The union chief Gerard Gelmini criticized the managers of the national train company, the SNCB, for being keen on buidling new stations and offices, instead of security equipments.

The strike has affected the railway transportion in Belgium, causing many cancellations and delays. Recent snows had also caused disruption of public transport in Belgium.

The accident happened at 8:45 local time (0745 GMT) on Monday morning in the Belgium town of Halle, some 15 kilometers southwest of Brussels, which is one of the worst rail accidents in the Belgian history.

See also here. And here. And here.

Railway workers have found the second black box from this week’s deadly train collision in Belgium – a crash that EU officials said demonstrated the need for member states to quickly install a fail-safe signalling system across the continent-wide patchwork of rail networks: here.

Britain: Rail union RMT has called for a red light on job cuts at Network Rail (NR) after a regulator said health and safety risks were already being caused by a lack of track patrols: here.

Construction workers at the Staythorpe power station in Nottinghamshire have staged an unofficial walkout after an alleged health and safety breach: here.