InsideTransit

“We were treated like animals”, said one passenger stuck on a Eurostar train. Passengers stranded for hours – some calling it a “death trap”. The BBC video shows passengers who made it out of the tunnels who have some choice words for the Eurostar management.

The Eurostar trains broke down as they left the cold air in northern France and entered the warmer tunnel en route to London.

John Keefe from Eurotunnel, the operator of the Channel Tunnel, said the situation was “absolutely extraordinary and unprecedented”.

“There’s never actually been an evacuation of a Eurostar train in the 15 years that the tunnel has been opened and last night we evacuated two whole trains to get people off.”

The BBC notes that five trains were stuck in the tunnel. Apparently it was freezing in the carriages and very little water or food was provided to the passengers. They continue, “Director of communications Mary Walsh said the company was “extremely sorry” for the delays and refunds would be available for all those affected.”

I’ve been on the Eurostar once in 2006 and overall enjoyed the trip.

Everyone always wants trains to go faster. Here in the northeast U.S, we have “Acela” which is supposed to be very fast but it seems to get to about 125 miles per hour max for about 5 minutes. Below is a video from France that shows a test train that hits an amazing 574.8 kilometres per hour. For us Americans, that’s over 350 miles per hour. Or nearly three times as fast as the fastest thing we’ve got here.

Even if you don’t care about trains, you should still watch the video. It’s put together like a movie promo and gets your heart going as they continue to speed up.

I sure hope one day in my lifetime we see trains like this around the world.