What caused Britain's worst train crash of the 21st century?

Rob Waugh
·Contributor
·3-min read
The scene at Great Heck near Selby, North Yorkshie, where rescue workers are recovering more bodies from the tangled wreckage of yesterdays train disaster. Heavy lifting gear is being brought in to start removing the twisted carriages 24 hours after the horrific crash * ... that killed 13 people and injured 70. 28/11/01: The trial of Gary Hart is starting at Leeds Crown Court, where he faces faces 10 counts of causing death by dangerous driving. The crash happened after Hart's Land Rover left the carriageway of the M62 motorway, plunged down an embankment and came to rest on the main Newcastle to London railway line. The vehicle was then hit by an express passenger train which then collided with a freight train heading in the opposite direction. 11/1/02: the Land Rover at the scence of the train crash at Great Heck, near Selby. Gary Hart, from Strubby, Lincolnshire who is due to be sentenced at Leeds Crown Court, after he was found guilty of causing the deaths of 10 men in the Selby train crash. The jury decided he had fallen asleep at the wheel of his Land Rover before it plunged off the M62 and onto the main East Coast railway line on February 28 last year near the North Yorkshire village of Great Heck. 11/01/02 Gary Hart, the driver convicted of causing the deaths of 10 people in the Selby rail crash, was jailed for five years at Leeds Crown Court Friday January 11, 2002. (Photo by John Giles - PA Images/PA Images via Getty Images)
The scene at Great Heck near Selby, North Yorkshire. (PA Images via Getty Images)

This article is part of Yahoo's 'On This Day' series

Britain’s worst rail crash of the 21st century saw 10 people dead including the drivers of two trains at Great Heck near Selby, North Yorkshire, on this day in 2001.

One man’s tiredness was to blame.

Builder Gary Hart, who was driving down the westbound carriageway of the M62, had been up much of the previous night talking on the phone to a woman he had met on the internet when he fell asleep at the wheel at just after 6am.

His Land Rover and its trailer smashed through crash barriers at the edge of the M62, and the car rolled 377 ft down an embankment onto the southbound tracks.

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Hart dialled 999, having woken up due to the crash.

Forty seconds seconds later he yelled, “There’s a train coming!” then said that the train had, “Gone straight through my Land Rover.”

The InterCity 225 going south was partially derailed but still travelling at 88 mph: it hit a 1,800-tonne coal train going north at 54 mph, according to Health and Safety Executive estimates.

Carriages of a freight train lie derailed at the side of the track after an accident near Selby, North Yorkshire which claimed thirteen lives. A further 70 people were injured when a high-speed GNER passenger train hit a runaway car and then collided with the freight train * ... which was carrying more than 1,000 tonnes of coal. The scene of devastation was on the East Coast main line near Selby in North Yorkshire. 28/02/01: The GNER engine 91023, which was involved in the rail crash in Yorkshire, in which 13 people died is the same one which was involved in the crash at Hatfield in October 2000. The engine was pushing from the back as the express ploughed into a car stuck on the rails. In the Hatfield crash, it was pulling from the front when the rear of the train slipped off the rails causing the accident that killed four people. (Photo by John Giles - PA Images/PA Images via Getty Images)
Carriages of a freight train lie derailed at the side of the track after an accident near Selby, North Yorkshire. (PA Images via Getty Images)

Both drivers were killed, along with six passengers and two other railway staff and 82 other people were seriously injured.

Mary Dunn, whose train driver husband Steve died in the crash, said she woke to the sound of sirens and later had to sit her two young children down and say, "You know, there was a train crash this morning that involved Dad's train.

"I've got to tell you that your Daddy's dead, and you won't see him again."

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All the coaches were damaged, but the fatalities were all in the first five coaches.

Hart was jailed for five years after being found guilty of causing the deaths of 10 people by dangerous driving.

The scene at Great Heck, near Selby in North Yorkshire, where 13 people died in a road and rail accident. The crash occurred when a Land Rover left the M62 near where it crosses the East Coast main line (pictured right). * The car was then in collision with the GNER express train which in turn collided with a freight train carrying more than 1,000 tonnes of coal, with many carriages coming to rest in a field. The remains of the two trains, which narrowly missed a number of houses in Great Heck, can be seen at the left of the picture. (Photo by Phil Noble - PA Images/PA Images via Getty Images)
The scene at Great Heck, near Selby in North Yorkshire, where 10 people died in a road and rail accident. (PA Images via Getty Images)

Ten years after the crash, Hart said, "I believe in fate and I was meant to be there that morning."

"No deaths occurred at the point of impact with my Land Rover.

"They all occurred 700 yards down the track which I feel other people should have been held accountable for, so in my own head I've dealt with it in that fashion."

Gary Hart leaves Selby Magistrates Court after his first appearence accused of causing the deaths of the ten people who died in the Selby rail disaster. * Hart, 36, of Church Lane, Strubby, Lincolnshire, appeared in connection with the incident at the village of Great Heck, near Selby, North Yorkshire, on February 28 2001, which claimed the lives of six passengers and four railway staff. Hart was driving a Land Rover which left the M62 motorway, careered down a grass embankment and ended up on the main East Coast rail line. (Photo by Owen Humphreys - PA Images/PA Images via Getty Images)
Gary Hart leaves Selby Magistrates' Court. He was later jailed for five years. (PA Images via Getty Images)

James Dunn, Steve Dunn's son, became a train driver himself in 2009. He was just nine at the time of the crash.

Mary said, “His dad would have been thrilled about it."

Coach D of the GNER train is moved by crane from the side of the tracks near the village of Great Heck in Yorkshire, following the train crash on 28/02/01. (Photo by Matthew Fearn - PA Images/PA Images via Getty Images)
Coach D of the GNER train is moved by crane from the side of the tracks near the village of Great Heck in Yorkshire. (PA Images via Getty Images)

“He had always been interested in the railway and his dad’s death made him even more determined to follow him.”

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