Irish Rail station manager in Waterford claims there was a mechanical fault on the 14.10 in Heustion and a spare train couldn't be found (imagine that...!) to operate the service at full capacity. Now no staff know anything about this alleged mechanical fault on Sunday evening and no steps were taken to deal with passenger numbers.
Now I find this very hard to believe as an extra 3 car set appeared in Waterford yesterday evening which wasn't there the previous Sunday when there was no mechanical fault on the 14.10 service. From the timetable point of view it was impossible for this second 3 car set to be in Waterford unless Irish Rail decided to run thie service empty to Waterford...
I put the question of why there was not a bus service in place to deal with the expected numbers but didn't get a definite answer and added that Mayo passengers received one. I also said that if this was the Cork line there would be no problems funding a replacement train and it would not of being allowed to operate at reduced capacity. Also no real answer.
Plenty of covering up of the situation and slightly conflicting stories form both ends. Overall he wasn't happy with what when on and there will be some words in Dublin over it during the week and asured people who he had being talking to over the issue that it was a one off and will not happen again.
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