for the better Regulation of Railways and for the Conveyance of Troops') gave the BoT powers to delay opening of new lines if the inspectorate was concerned about "Incompleteness of the Works or permanent Way, or the Insufficiency of the Establishment" for working the line. Crash investigation Their first investigation was of the Howden rail crash on 7 August 1840, which had killed five passengers (although the inspector's report said four, three passengers were killed instantly, two dying later of their injuries) as a result of the derailment of a train caused by the fall of a large casting from a wagon on a passenger train. The inspectorate's reports of their accident investigations were made to the BoT alone, but eventually published as part of the BoT's annual report to Parliament. Competence Until the late 1960s HMRI's inspecting officers were all recruited from the Corps of Royal Engineers. In the early years of the inspectorate, their competence to adjudicate on civil engineering structures was questioned by critics, sometimes with good reason. A reorganisation of the inspectorate in November 1846 abolished the post of inspector-general, and led to the departure of Major-General Charles Pasley, the incumbent, and one of his subordinates. Pasley had come under criticism after the bridges and earthworks of the North British Railway's line from Edinburgh to Berwick – approved by Pasley in June 1846 – failed to withstand heavy rain in September 1846, with nineteen miles of track being rendered unusable. Temporary works were undertaken to restore a service, Pasley approved them (orally), but some of the new work then proved faulty. In 1849 the Manchester, Sheffield and Lincolnshire Railway's Torksey viaduct across the River Trent was not initially accepted by the railway inspector Lintorn Simmons because he was unhappy with its novel (tubular girder) design by John Fowler. This decision (and also the basic premise that a bridge designed by a member of the Institution of Civil Engineers (ICE) which had passed all practical tests could be rejected by a railway inspector because he was uncomfortable with its novel design) was criticised by the ICE: Threatened with a call for a parliamentary enquiry should approval continue to be withheld, the inspectorate reconsidered and approved the bridge un-modified. Subsequently, and consequently, the BoT took the view that (as it explained in defending itself from criticism that the defects in the Tay Bridge should have been seen and