(09 Nov 2014, 11:52 am)Bus_User wrote Your words was "surely not another train up in flames" which clearly suggests a serious fire on the train where infact if there was any fire it would be underneath the train and any smoke will more than likely to be a white smoke than any thick black smoke and the photo in the EC would seemingly suggest that. And no person would stay on the train if the train was up in flames and there was thick black smoke heading into the passenger saloon. Maybe you should of read more than just a single report? I also have to question why the passengers were all trying to get fresh air from open windows and heading down the train to avoid the smoke instead of using the Emergency exits, maybe they were instructed from the driver not to do so, I doubt we will never know.
Not doubting this is a serious incident and the sight of smoke will be a scary experience even if there was no actual fire but I just think your choice of words is quite misleading really.
As for new trains then it was always the plan to refurbish the trains again as opposed to buying new stock but only Nexus have got themselves to blame. If they were more interesting in buying new stock instead of blabbering on about the now infamous Project Orpheus(which is to create street tram running along with the metro) then we may of had new trains by now. As it is though, new trains seems a long way off and a bit of a fantasy. You also have to bear in mind, unlike buses, years of planning has to take place before new stock even get built.
My post was written soon after the incident occurred and the message which citaro5284 copied and pasted sounded quite serious. This was the only source of information on the public domain about the incident at the time, so I was under the impression that the incident was serious. If I have an interest in something and information is actually on the public domain, I will read it... Even then, information is skewed by the media and mightn't be 100% accurate.
Clearly, as with similar things in the past, you're trying to defend the Tyne & Wear Metro system (I'll avoid saying either Nexus or DB - wouldn't like to get it wrong!
) but I think you've jumped the gun slightly and might have seen the opportunity to have a bit of a debate with me without actually looking at the whole picture. As someone with an interest in the Tyne & Wear Metro system and potentially someone with access to 'inside information', it may be worth trying to post in a manner which is more informative rather than seemingly argumentative, with the intention of clearing up any 'misleading' posts in the process? 
There's only so much money you can spend on refurbishing buses and trains before it becomes a wasted effort, with reliability issues still being prevalent. I rarely read Tyne & Wear Metro's Social Media pages, though I have in the past seen a comment suggesting that they'd prefer for trains to turn up instead of trains being refurbished. Subject to opinion, of course, but it does show that some customers are looking at the refurbishment of trains negatively as their presence in the active fleet could mean that their train actually turns up. If you read the Go North East section of the forum, you'll know I'm not one to assume missing trains are due to mechanical faults, though it seems (judging by Michael's post above), that 'failed trains' are the reason for delays and long waits at cold Metro stations which are mechanical faults.
I'd suggest that each and every 'failed train' won't be recorded on Tyne & Wear Metro's Social Media pages either as they're often quite slow with getting information on there in the first place, and what does appear can be inaccurate (see citaro5284's post above regarding the differences in posts between GNE and T&WM), meaning that there could be more delays than what we actually discuss on this forum.
The current system needs to work before another system is brought in to work alongside it - it seems somewhat silly in my eyes to bring in more responsibility when reliability is as poor* as it is at present.
*see this post for Nexus Annual Reports & Accounts for last three years, showing a decrease in punctuality for the past three years, which I consider to be quite poor.