WATCH: Train smashes into car parked on Staffordshire railway tracks
A man has been jailed after driving his car onto railway tracks in Staffordshire where it was struck by a train.
Jonathon Geoffrey Mather, aged 36 of Pearl Close, Oakwood, Derby, was sentenced to five years and eight months in jail at Stafford Crown Court today after previously pleading guilty to obstructing the railway.
The court heard how on Monday, July 20, 2015, Mather had driven his car, a Vauxhall Insignia, onto the railway line at Clay Mills Crossing then drove a further 220 meters down the track before abandoning his car straddling the rails and running off.
A short while later a passenger service travelling between Derby and Burton on Trent, which had 40 people on board, came along the same stretch of track. The train was travelling at 100mph but luckily the driver spotted the car and managed to hit the emergency brakes at the last minute, resulting in the train hitting the vehicle at 70mph.
Luckily no-one on board the train was injured but the incident resulted in over £650,000 in costs to the rail industry in delays, compensation and damage to the tracks and train.
