The Rail Accident Investigation Branch is currently investigating a derailment of an Avanti West Coast Pendolino in Cumbria.

The accident happened at Shap in Cumbria on the 3rd November after the Pendolino hit a landslip whilst heading to London Euston.

The 04:28 from Glasgow Central to London Euston hit the landslip at 83mph. Minor injuries were reported but thankfully, no one was seriously hurt.

Urgent safety advice has, however, been released by the RAIB as part of its ongoing investigation.

The investigation has found that lineside monitoring equipment used by Network Rail may not be able to detect the failure of slopes in some circumstances.

This may mean that the equipment may not provide the data as expected to support decision-making during extreme weather conditions.

Around 4 hours before the accident, the land sensors showed minor movement but were below the threshold to generate an alert.

At around 04:30, the two sensors in the landslip path were tipped over and subsumed by the material and the evidence suggests this happened too quickly to generate an alert to Network Rail.

The RAIB has also concluded that the sensors wireless signal was unable to pass through the debris to establish a conecction.