Eurostar trains stuck in tunnel due to cold weather (19 December 2009)

[whole diary]

[paul7575]

My other thought is that the tunnel is 14 miles long so you will never get standed more than 7 miles from a portal.  There is a service tunnel offering a safe lit route out, so why keep people on a stranded train for 15 hours when they could walk to the nearest entrance in less than 3 hours? 

 

It is more than double your distances in fact. It's nearly 32 miles between the portals, with about 24 miles under the channel. The two crossover caverns are at about 11 miles and 22 miles from the English portal...

But I don't disagree, there may be circumstances where walking out would be perfectly safe for most passengers.

Paul

[paul7575]

While accepting that this incident was a, albeit unforeseen, cock-up of the first order and was, at least initially, very badly handled, am I the only one who considers that some of the reporting, particularly by the BBC^» (British Broadcasting Corporation - home page), has bordered on the hysterical?...

Isn't all media reporting of this sort of thing always exaggerated? Whatever mode of transport, it doesn't matter...

Misery for motorists, chaos for commuters, ordeal for passengers etc etc is the normal commentary for day to day hassles. So for a biggie like this they run out of superlatives.  It's helped develop a culture of whingers where no one can apparently cope with life's little problems, and there always has to be someone to blame.  And anyone who's lucky enough can have a rant to the BBC cameras - with their tale of woe assumed to be the facts.

Paul

[Electric train]

My other thought is that the tunnel is 14 miles long so you will never get standed more than 7 miles from a portal.  There is a service tunnel offering a safe lit route out, so why keep people on a stranded train for 15 hours when they could walk to the nearest entrance in less than 3 hours? 

 

It is more than double your distances in fact. It's nearly 32 miles between the portals, with about 24 miles under the channel. The two crossover caverns are at about 11 miles and 22 miles from the English portal...

But I don't disagree, there may be circumstances where walking out would be perfectly safe for most passengers.

Paul

The tunnel does not run flat and level, it has some steep inclines.  Evacuating 300 plus people requires a lot of supervision walking them out of the tunnel is high risk you would need paramedic support as not every one would be fit enough also how do you manage people with disabilities

[paul7575]

'May be circumstances', and 'most people' obviously doesn't include those with disabilities.

Paul

[Worcester_Passenger]

There's a neat little graphic on the Guardian website which gives a nice succinct explanation of what went pear-shaped with the power cars. Possibly a little simplistic but it made sense to me.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/interactive/2009/dec/21/eurostar-channel-tunnel-snow-interactive

Looks unconvincing to me. The membrane sounds as if it's like Goretex, which is not going to have any problems with any type of snow. And inside the "engine room" is going to be nice and warm, so that it'd melt immediately.

I'm more convinced by the explanation that centres on a build-up of snow on part of the train - such that it's nice and stable while it's outside in the cold, but becomes unstable once it's in the warm of the tunnel. Think of snow on the bonnet of a car : people don't bother to clear that, they just do their windows. Then a few miles down the road they're surprised by the bonnet getting warm and all of the snow suddenly sliding towards them. Is there some part of the train where snow could build up in this way, then suddenly go woosh once it warmed up in the tunnel, and damage the pantograph or some other exposed equipment on the top of the train?

[plymothian]

Well I have to spend at least one extra day in France and take a chance tomorrow on the turn up and go service.

SNCF^▸ (Societe Nationale des Chemins de fer Francais - French National Railways) have been great and have allowed me to change my ticket into Paris twice for free, now I wonder whether FGW^▸ (First Great Western) will do anything for missing my train booked today and thus having to buy an Anytime Single if and when I get to London?  I doubt it.

[Brucey]

SNCF^▸ (Societe Nationale des Chemins de fer Francais - French National Railways) have been great and have allowed me to change my ticket into Paris twice for free

Out of interest, is your SNCF ticket a CIV^▸ (International Convention for the transportation of Passengers) ticket?  If it isn't, they are probably doing this as they are a large shareholder in Eurostar (still 50%?)

now I wonder whether FGW^▸ (First Great Western) will do anything for missing my train booked today and thus having to buy an Anytime Single if and when I get to London?

Don't be silly 

[plymothian]

No, they're not.   Bought completely separately.

In fact they changed them three times - when I arrived at Pais l'Est late because Eurostar was late they checked the arrival time and reissued for the next train.  Then when the TGV^▸ (Train a Grande Vitesse) service was running slowly because of the snow they changed the ticket back to Paris for an earlier train to allow more interchange time.  Now they're changing it again for another day.

[bleeder4]

Interesting 2 page article about this whole affair on El Reg:

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/12/22/eurostar_eurotunnel_fiasco/

Interesting point about 'if you send 3 trains into a tunnel and none come out, why send in 2 more' and the author implies that Eurostar are essentially operating blind when their trains are in the tunnel as EuroTunnel doesn't provide them info.

[plymothian]

I don't believe it.

France 24 have just reported that everyone who turned up at Gare du Nord got on a train.
So now I've paid 15 euros for an other train, plus whatever it will cost at Paddington tomorrow, and accommodation, when I a could have left at 16.00 as origninally booked for 

[IndustryInsider]

Sky News are reporting that the London end backlog has also been cleared and that passengers for tickets for travel today may well be OK if they turn up. [Ahem] At last there's light at the end of the tunnel... 

[Brusselier]

Our group decided not to stick around and wait for Eurostar, we went on an adventure (along with two randoms found at Brussel Zuid). went like this:

- Brussels to Rotterdam by SNCB/NS International Train (dep 0918)
- Rotterdam to Hoek van Holland by NS sprinter
- Hoek to Harwich by Stena line
- Harwich to Maningtree
- Maningtree to Shenfield
- Shenfield to Southend Victoria all by NXEA^▸ (National Express East Anglia)
- Picked up a colleague's car in Southend, he drove to nr Bath (arr 0500, stop off at another colleagues for a few hours sleep)
- driven to Bristol Parkway and got train down to EXD^» (Exeter St Davids - next trains), colleague returns to Southend

Total: 32 hours instead of 6, but still got here much earlier than if we'd waited for ES

The Dutch were completely unprepared for the snow and were making service alterations left-right-and-centre. platforms hadn't been swept and were covered in 2 inches of snow and very slippery. The train to Hoek very nearly didn't go. There were also issues docking at Harwich. On the UK^▸ (United Kingdom) trains all was fine bar minor delays. Well done NXEA and AXC^» (Arriva Cross Country - about)!

Very happy to be home!

[plymothian]

I'm home! 

[Chris from Nailsea]

Glad to hear that, Brusselier and plymothian! 

[Chris from Nailsea]

From the BBC^» (British Broadcasting Corporation - home page):

Eurotunnel accuses Eurostar of ignoring safety rules

Eurotunnel has accused Eurostar of ignoring safety rules when evacuating passengers from trains last weekend.

The Channel Tunnel operator said evacuations were prolonged because people took bags with them "in complete violation" of safety procedures. It also rejected claims it contributed to the chaos when 2,000 people were trapped in five broken down trains.

Eurostar was unavailable for comment on Friday but last week blamed Eurotunnel for poor communication.

On Christmas Day the tunnel group also criticised Eurostar's passenger communication after the breakdowns, caused by condensation entering the high-speed trains' electrical systems. In a statement it said: "Although in continued contact with our teams, it is clear the Eurostar teams obviously did not give the right information to passengers." It added this had "led to a movement of worry".

Eurostar has admitted a communications failure, but has also partly blamed Eurotunnel, which it said was responsible for evacuations and relaying information to passengers in the tunnel.

But Eurotunnel said its staff had reacted quickly to help stranded passengers and had not failed to communicate with them. Its statement said: "Although... our teams took actions in a rapid and professional manner going beyond their normal responsibilities, we have been unjustly suspected in some quarters of not reacting in an appropriate way."