28 people die and around 100 are injured, some seriously, when an S-Bahn crashes into a parked construction train in Hamburg on October 5, 1961. The devastating accident caused nationwide horror.
by Jochen Lambernd
"I failed. I forgot the construction train," said Alfred Messer, then 57-year-old Chief Secretary of the Federal Railways, immediately after the accident. He blames himself for it. In a later report, which describes Messer's human error somewhat awkwardly, it says:"The unfortunate accident arose from the fact that the dispatcher Messer released the exit for the S-Bahn train PS 3819 by setting the exit signal F without first showing the route properly checked."
It is 10:34 p.m. that Thursday when Messer gives the S-Bahn train from the direction of the main station the departure sign for Bergedorf. His colleague, the 28-year-old federal railway assistant candidate Harald Kruse, also got this information. Only moments later, Messer remembers that a construction train was still shunting along the track, loaded with huge I-beams for a new bridge. But it is already too late. Only the driver of the construction train can jump off in time.
Collision at a speed of 70 - steel girders drill into the S-Bahn
At 10:38 p.m., the S-Bahn, which had accelerated to 70 km/h, crashed into the unlit shunting train between the Berliner Tor and Rothenburgsort stations with unbridled force. The noise is deafening. The steel girders bore into the first carriage of the S-Bahn from the front - around 13 meters deep. Fatally, their dimensions fit exactly into the cabin of the train and squeeze it together. Passengers are trapped, thrown through the air and horribly mutilated. Hardly anyone in the first carriage survives.
Difficult situation for the rescuers
Only a few minutes after the impact, the first helpers arrive. Plenty of police and ambulances are called. The fire brigade also sends all available vehicles to the scene of the accident. However, it is difficult to achieve. It is on a bridge - at a height of around twelve meters. In order to be able to overcome the embankment better, ropes are stretched. Firefighters and police officers are trying desperately to free the trapped people and save lives. With welding torches, crowbars and axes, they painstakingly separate the bent metal parts from each other. Meanwhile, the injured are wandering around in the dark, confused. A number of passers-by volunteered to help. Walter Schmedebach - then health senator - says later that he saw young girls and women who held ropes for hours on which the stretchers were roped down.
Doctors amputate body parts on the railway embankment
For some victims, the injuries are so life-threatening that doctors have to amputate arms or legs on the spot. Screams of pain from those trapped can be heard for hours. The emergency services, which also include the Technical Relief Agency (THW), last until 5 a.m. in the morning. A total of 175 firefighters are on duty. Unlike today, rescue workers were not given psychological support after such devastating accidents. They carry the disturbing impressions with them for years.
On this day - probably the most terrible in the history of the Hamburg S-Bahn - many people lost their relatives, friends and acquaintances. Families are torn apart. Many injured people have to come to terms with handicaps throughout their lives. Compensation for pain and suffering is paid, but it is unclear whether the compensation is sufficient in individual cases.
Eyewitness survives because she didn't get in front
Heike Raczka, who is now 83 years old, can still remember the day of the accident very well - she was sitting in exactly this S-Bahn at the time. It was just a stroke of luck that nothing happened to her. On October 5, 1961, she actually wanted to get in at the front, but because it was too crowded there, she sat in the middle. "Nothing happened to me because of that." Only a shoe and her hat, which she wears, fly around. The extent of the catastrophe is not at all clear to her at first:she does not see the smashed front cars of the S-Bahn with the dead and injured that night. "They said it was an accident and that we should get out and walk across the tracks back to the Berliner Tor." The shock doesn't come until the next day when she looks at the newspaper.
Dispatcher sentenced
Alfred Messer was put on trial in 1963. Negligent homicide, negligent bodily harm and negligent endangerment of transport - these are the charges. Messer's colleague Harald Kruse is also in the dock. Judges, prosecutors and defense attorneys are equally trying to help the federal railway employees as much as possible and to stand by them humanely. Both have never been guilty of anything before. On the night of the accident, Messer may have been distracted by paperwork he was doing on the side. And Kruse apparently couldn't imagine that his higher-ranking colleague would mistakenly give him the signal "Free travel" and forget a whole train. The verdict for Messer:one year in prison on probation. Kruse is acquitted.
New technology not yet in use
Back then, it was bitter to realize that there was already a new type of technology that no longer required human intervention. The "block system" allows each train to set the signals automatically for the following train via track contacts. In the event of unscheduled shunting, the technology blocks all relevant tracks. This so-called self-block was already being used between Poppenbüttel and Altona. For the route between Berliner Tor and Bergedorf, on the other hand, the route still has to be reset for each train and is therefore secured accordingly - unless this security is canceled manually. At the time, the Bundesbahn firmly rejected accusations that a complete "block" installation had not been carried out to date for reasons of economy, but emphasized the planned step-by-step implementation.
Never got over the guilt
Alfred Messer will never recover from the accident - the guilt weighs too heavily for him. It is no longer possible for the father of a daughter and a son to continue working for the railways, despite great efforts. Cures and vacations don't help him. Former colleagues report that Messer stared absentmindedly in front of him for hours. He retires early and has to be admitted to mental hospitals several times. He later lives in seclusion with his wife in Hamburg and isolates himself more and more. He's a broken man. Messer died in Altona in 1985 at the age of 82.