At the beginning of July, the Bishop Aukland Line, otherwise known as the Tees Valley Line which runs for 38 miles between Bishop Auckland and Saltburn, was targeted by slingshot attackers thought to be linked with the beginning of the school holidays.

Northern Rail has stated this will not be allowed to happen again as it puts its Trains, Staff, and Passengers at risk of injury.

Northern responded to these attacks by deploying their Travel Safe Officers along the route. These 60 Travel Safe Officers normally patrol the Northern Network alongside the British Transport Police.

Northern Rail, British Transport Police, and Network Rail combined to locate the miscreants of the attacks through the use of drones as well as face-to-face interactions with the perpetrators.

Following this intervention, no further incidents were reported along this important rail artery.

Throwing objects at moving trains is hugely dangerous and an incredibly irresponsible thing to do. We continue to work with our industry partners to prevent incidents like these and identify those who are responsible. Mindless acts of vandalism like this can have potentially fatal consequences which is why we take every incident seriously. Drones have demonstrated their effectiveness in tackling a variety of incidents through proactive and reactive flights across the network giving officers a bird’s-eye view of any criminality on the railway.

BTP Inspector Mary-Anne Snowden

Passengers are reminded that if they ever need to contact the British Transport Police, they can do this by texting 61016 or calling 0800 40 50 40.