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In the early morning of January 9, 1973, in the cold and silent air, a palpitating silence wafted from the Pou Cheng Railway. The main thoroughfare, which runs through Shaanxi and Sichuan provinces, is always bustling with traffic, but in the middle of the night, everything seems so silent except for the occasional faint sound of railroad tracks.
In the deep darkness of the night before dawn, a light flickering at a constant rate slowly approached from afar, becoming more and more visible—the headlights of the 83-train express train, which was powered by electricity.
As one of the first electrically driven trains to be put into operation in China, 83 was undoubtedly the pride of that era.
It reached a staggering top speed of 130 kilometers per hour, which was a miracle at the level of technology at the time.
According to the pre-set schedule, train 83 was supposed to arrive at Guanyinshan Station before midnight and continue after completing the rendezvous with freight train No. 804. However, 83 have missed the scheduled meeting time window due to a delay of nearly 30 minutes.
In order to avoid further delays, the train driver, Wu Zhengjun, resolutely decided to rise to the challenge and increase the speed of the train to the extreme.
Wu Zhengjun was sweating in the cab of the train, his eyes were firmly fixed on the front, always paying attention to the trend of the railway. As an experienced veteran driver, he is confident that he can handle this challenge.
As long as you can get to Guanyinshan Station before train 804 passes, everything will be back to normal.
However, who would have predicted that this seemingly trivial decision would have such serious consequences? What Wu Zhengjun did not know was that he had not rested for 24 hours in a row, and fatigue had penetrated deeply into his body and mind.
The staff on duty at Guanyinshan Station quickly noticed that the 83 trains had not slowed down, and they quickly sent a slowing down command through hand-held signal lights and radios, but they responded to a dead silence, as if no one had heard.
"Ahh
By the time the crashing waves had finally subsided, the two locomotives and several carriages had become distorted and unrecognizable.
The officers on duty looked at each other, and they were at a loss in the face of the sudden disaster.
In this way, a major railway accident that shook the whole country was tragically staged in the eyes of everyone. The most regrettable thing is that this tragedy actually originated from the little exhaustion and surprise of an old driver.
Although the accident of the collision between the No. 83 train and the No. 804 wagon is embarrassing, however, after careful investigation, we found that the source of this disaster actually originated from a personnel scheduling error in the Baoji Railway Depot!
Originally, on January 9, the person in charge of driving the 83rd train was supposed to be another experienced employee, but because he was suddenly unable to come, the duty officer of the Baoji depot had to hastily recruit 53-year-old Wu Zhengjun to take his place.
For Wu Zhengjun, the 83rd train is undoubtedly the latest and most cutting-edge "diamond car" in his hands. As the first batch of electrically powered trains put into operation in China, its operating system is complex beyond the grasp of ordinary people, and only senior drivers such as Wu Zhengjun can control it with ease.
In the face of the urgent call of his superiors, despite his physical and mental exhaustion, Wu Zhengjun still firmly accepted the task. As a conscientious veteran driver, he is well aware of the great responsibility and will never give up his responsibilities at a critical moment.
Late at night on January 8, the ringing of the phone of the officer on duty woke Wu Zhengjun from his dream. Although his consciousness was not yet fully awake, out of his persistent pursuit of his profession, Wu Zhengjun did not hesitate to agree to the request for substitute shifts.
Early the next morning, he appeared at the station early, and when he saw his tired face, all the operators present were moved.
However, who could have predicted that this work handover would lead to such a tragic tragedy? Wu Zhengjun silently stepped up to the cockpit, gently started the 83 trains, and headed forward.
In that dark and cold night, except for the occasional sound of railroad tracks, he was accompanied only by the sound of his own heartbeat.
In fact, not long after the train departed, Wu Zhengjun felt a deep exhaustion hit his heart. The 24-hour high-intensity work used up to almost all his energy.
However, he told himself that he only needed to grit his teeth and hold on for a while, and when he arrived at Guanyinshan Station, he would be able to hand over the shift smoothly and take a short rest.
However, by the time the deputy sensed the anomaly and tried to wake up Wu Zhengjun, it was too late. When the 83rd train slowly drove into Guanyinshan Station, the station staff on duty immediately realized the seriousness of the problem.
In accordance with the prescribed procedure, they quickly issued a slow-down command via hand-held signal lights and radios, but they were responded to by a deathly silence.
When the deputy saw that Wu Zhengjun's originally ruddy face suddenly turned pale, he couldn't help but be so nervous that his heart was about to jump out! He desperately pushed Wu Zhengjun and shouted his name loudly.
However, the man apparently fell into a deep sleep, oblivious to the thrills around him.
At this critical moment, train 83 slammed into the station area at an astonishing speed of up to 130 kilometers per hour, while freight train 804 ahead was faintly visible in the dark night.
At this moment, the deputy driver was already out of order, and he shook Wu Zhengjun's body frantically, trying to wake up the experienced old driver. Finally, after a violent shock, Wu Zhengjun opened his eyes slightly, his face full of confusion and confusion.
"Brakes...... Brakes!" The deputy's voice trembled with fear.
"How did it come to this?!"
Wu Zhengjun's head was dizzy, he didn't have time to think about it, and his right hand instinctively pulled the emergency brake handle.
Train No. 804 is close at hand, and it is only a few tens of meters away from Train No. 83! Wu Zhengjun felt as if his brain was swept by a violent wind, and he could not think normally, and his whole person seemed to be thrown into the sky and then slammed to the ground.
With a deafening "click", wild metal shards flew everywhere. Wu Zhengjun clung to the edge of the bridge to avoid being thrown out of the car.
He looked dizzily ahead, and saw the wreckage of two trains not far away, intertwined, like a monster that had just woken up. People's screams and cries came and went in his ears, and Wu Zhengjun only felt that the world was spinning, and as soon as it was dark in front of his eyes, he completely lost consciousness.
The first few cars of the 83rd train were badly deformed by the violent impact, and even the cab was destroyed in an instant. What is worrying is that Wu Zhengjun and his deputy are trapped under the fragments of the car body, and life and death are at stake.
As soon as the accident was about to happen, the Baoji Railway Department immediately launched an emergency rescue plan. Rescuers rushed to Guanyinshan Station, but they were stunned by what they saw — the front half of the two trains had been completely twisted and deformed, littered with dumped luggage and the mutilated bodies of passengers.
Even more distressing is the fact that the bodies of some passengers were stuck between the two trains, leaving little hope of survival. Faced with such a tragic scene, rescuers could only cut the body with their hands in order to rescue the bodies of the victims.
The scene immediately descended into chaos, and the casualties continued to deteriorate. When the fire was finally extinguished, people were shocked to find that the serious accident had claimed 22 lives and injured more than 100 others, including a staggering 44 serious injuries.
When we mention the loss of property, people cannot help but sigh: The incomparably expensive No. 83 train head and the No. 804 wagon locomotive have become scrap metal, and the price of these two engine structures alone is as high as several million yuan! This is almost like an astronomical bill, which is almost worth the total financial revenue of the Baoji City Government for an entire year! This is undoubtedly a heavy blow to the entire country's railway transportation system.
What is even more serious is that this accident has aroused widespread attention and heated discussions across the country. Various conspiracy theories and rumors are spreading among the people, some people suspect that this is a long-planned action by foreign spies, and some people suspect that the brake failure is caused by equipment failure...... Some superstitious people even pointed the finger at Wu Zhengjun, declaring that "he has fallen into evil."
In the face of such a suspicious public opinion environment, the Baoji Railway Department had to urgently set up a special investigation team to go all out to pursue the truth of the accident. After an in-depth and meticulous investigation, the investigation team finally revealed the truth: the culprit of the accident was Wu Zhengjun's fatigue driving caused by 24 hours of high-intensity work on temporary replacement for others.
Such a tragic railway accident has undoubtedly caused an uproar throughout the country, and all kinds of speculations and rumors have been widely circulated among the people, and public opinion has been in an uproar. Some people are convinced that this was a terrorist attack orchestrated by foreign agents in order to create turmoil.
They questioned why the driver of the 83rd train fell asleep at such a critical moment, and was it really controlled by some mysterious force?
What's more, the spearhead of suspicion was directly aimed at Wu Zhengjun, declaring that "he has fallen into evil". It has also been suggested that the root cause of the accident was a serious equipment failure on train 83, which caused the braking system to malfunction.
In the face of such a surging torrent of public opinion, the Baoji Railway Department had to set up a special investigation team to be fully responsible for thoroughly investigating the exact cause of the accident. The investigation team was quickly assembled and immediately engaged in intensive work.
First, the team did not hesitate to focus on the high-profile 83 train, conducting an in-depth examination of the dilapidated front end of the front section to find out if there was a suspected cause of equipment failure.
After many rigorous tests, the investigators did not find any anomalies, and all equipment, including the braking system, was operating robustly, which allowed the initial speculation of a "train failure" to be preliminarily ruled out.
Subsequently, the investigation team turned its attention to Wu Zhengjun himself. They checked Wu Zhengjun's work history and personal information in detail in recent years, and found that the experienced veteran driver had performed well in his career in the past five years, and had never made any mistakes or derelictions of duty, which was far from the image of the "evil spirit" villain described in the rumors.
In the end, a subtle detail caught the attention of the investigation team -- in the wreckage of the front part of train No. 83, there were brake marks of emergency braking! This undoubtedly proved that Wu Zhengjun was not indifferent when life and death were at stake, but tried with all his might to control the train.
After a more in-depth investigation, the investigation team finally revealed the culprit of the entire incident: it turned out that late at night on January 8, Wu Zhengjun received a temporary substitute notice, asking him to continue driving train No. 83 in the early morning of the next day.
However, according to normal work regulations, the continuous working hours of each driver were strictly limited, however, during the deployment of personnel that night, there were omissions.
In the end, the investigation team came to a sad conclusion: Wu Zhengjun had been working for more than 24 hours on the day of the incident, and his physical strength was exhausted by extreme exhaustion, and he accidentally fell into a short sleep when the train was about to enter the station, which led to the tragedy.
And all this stems from the momentary negligence of the Baoji Railway Depot and the mistake of personnel scheduling.