EAW047077 ENGLAND (1952). The aftermath of the Harrow and Wealdstone rail crash, Wealdstone, 1952. This image was marked by Aerofilms Ltd for photo editing.

The Harrow and Wealdstone rail crash was a three-train collision at Harrow and Wealdstone station in London during the morning rush hour of 8 October 1952. 112 people were killed and 340 injured (88 of these being detained in hospital); it remains the worst peacetime rail crash in the United Kingdom.[1]

An overnight express train from Perth crashed at speed into the rear of a local passenger train standing at a platform at the station. The wreckage blocked adjacent lines and was struck within seconds by a "double-headed" express train travelling north at 60 mph (97 km/h). A subsequent Ministry of Transport report on the crash found that the driver of the Perth train had passed a caution signal and two danger signals before colliding with the local train. The accident accelerated the introduction of Automatic Warning System – by the time the report had been published British Railways had agreed to a five-year plan to install the system that warned drivers that they had passed an adverse signal.