Television Drama and Authenticity

I caught up with the latest Dalziel and Pascoe drama yesterday (originally screened Monday 13th and Tuesday 14th March). While watching television drama usually requires a suspension of disbelief (I mean, just how many murderous brother/sister incestuous relationships are there for crying out loud?), sometimes programme makers stretch things just a little too far. I still can’t watch Steve McQueen trying to jump the barbed wire in “The Great Escape” without shouting “That’s not a wartime BMW! It’s got telescopic suspension and an upright engine – it’s a British bike from the 1950s” And, of course, the scene is killed for me because the film makers got such a simple thing wrong – much like the makers of “Where Eagles Dare” with their helicopter that hadn’t been invented yet…

This is exacerbated if the subject matter being stretched is one where the viewer is an occupational expert. The Dalziel and Pascoe plot revolved around a coach crash on a level crossing – topical, you might think. Clearly the scriptwriters did. The trouble, though, is that they were so incompetent and lazy that they didn’t bother to do any research. If they had, they would not have come up with the laughably implausible plot device that they did.

In the scene, the coach driver is attempting to commit suicide and wants to take the football team on the coach with him as he blames them for the death of his daughter. So far, so good. Unfortunately this is a modernised level crossing with full barriers. These are operated from the signalbox – which you could see in-shot on the nearby station platform. This means that the signaller can see the crossing. This is essential as the signalling rules and regulations require the crossing to be clear before the signaller attempts to lower the barriers. Such crossings are either in direct line of sight from the signalbox or controlled via CCTV. The signaller will always check before attempting to lower the barriers – always. Therefore, upon looking out and seeing a bloody great coach parked in the middle of the crossing, only a homicidal maniac would make any attempt to lower the barriers.

Even if our signaller is a complete fuckwit as presumed by the programme makers, the signalling system has interlocking. Until the barriers are lowered, the “crossing clear” button won’t work. If that button is not pressed and the signaller won’t have pressed it because there’s a bloody great coach parked on the crossing, the signals won’t clear – and, importantly, the signaller won’t even attempt to clear the signals, just as he won’t have attempted to lower the barriers or press the crossing clear button because there’s a bloody great coach parked on the crossing. FFS! Therefore, because the signals cannot clear, the train would be held at the previous signal until the crossing is clear and could not possibly have collided with the bloody great coach parked in the middle of the crossing. That’s how railway signalling works.

All they had to do was choose an automatic half barrier such as the one at Upton Nervet and the scene would have worked as the signaller does not control the operation of the barriers. Another scenario that would have worked would have the driver crash through the barriers after they were lowered. As it was, the whole thing was utter twaddle. And, being an ex signaller, I was screaming at the television, shouting that this couldn’t happen and what fuckwits the scriptwriters were.

So, if you’re a script writer, please, do a bit of research before you insult our intelligence with utter bollocks like this again… Please?