Sun WITHDRAWS Islamophobic Lies

For the Murdoch goons at the Super Soaraway Currant Bun, telling lies about followers of The Prophet is mere routine; actually saying sorry for the lies is something rather more unusual. Today has brought one of those unusual moments, as the paper has pulled an article from its website, and issued a “Correction”, which as so often has been published at the lower left of Page 2, where most readers will not see it.

The train that derailed was similar to this one

As Zelo Street pointed out at the time, the assertion “RAMADAN TRAIN WRECK Muslim train driver crashed after going without food or drink for 15 hours during Ramadan … Officials reveal the driver ran through TWO red lights at London's Paddington Station” was not supported by the conclusions of the RAIB report into the derailment, which happened in June during the evening rush hour, and there were not two red signals.

And the claim “Rail accident experts claimed his fast caused the rush-hour derailment that led to three days of disruption” was a flat-out lie. The RAIB - the Sun failed to pony up any independent analysis - concluded that it was “unable to determine whether this interruption to his sleep, and subsequent fasting, was a factor in what happened on this occasion”.

Easy to spot: the original (wrong) story

As I said at the time, all that happened was that, during an exceptionally busy time of day - the evening rush hour - planned workings in and out of London’s Paddington station had to be changed at very short notice. The driver concerned made a mistake, believing that he was cleared to take his train into Platform 1, rather than stop short at Signal SN6004. He therefore passed that signal, and the trap points derailed the train rather than allow it to continue and collide with a train that was departing from that platform.

The Sun’s story was little short of incitement: it was certainly scaremongering. So Miqdaad Versi, who is Assistant Secretary General of the Muslim Council, complained to press regulator IPSO, who on this occasion were presented with such a blatant pack of Sun lies that they had little option other than to order the paper to publish a correction.

Not easy to spot: the correction (at lower left)

The hand-wringing and forced regret bears savouring in full. “IN a story ‘Ramadan Train Driver in Crash’ (20 Aug) we implied that the Rail Accident Investigation Branch said the cause of the derailment at Paddington was that the driver had been fasting during Ramadan … In fact they were unable to conclude that fasting was a factor in the crash on evidence available, although they observed that there is research showing that fasting can affect concentration levels”. In other words, the Sun admits lying. And there’s more.

As I said at the time, “The train passed ONE signal showing a Stop aspect: a ‘ground signal’ which shows two white lights to give a Proceed aspect, and two red ones for Stop”. The Sun has now admitted its hacks did not know their subject: “It was also stated that the driver of a derailed train ran through TWO red lights at London’s Paddington Station. In fact the two red lights were on the same signal. We are happy to clarify”.

The moral of the story being never to trust the Murdoch goons when they cobble together packs of lies about Scary Muslims (tm), and never to trust any of the tabloid pack when it comes to figuring out one end of The Railway from the other.

Well done Miqdaad Versi. And remember, you get the right story here on Zelo Street.