120° hell on broken train

Passengers trapped for hours in one of the worst rail breakdowns for years today described their ordeals.

Some fainted in the 120F temperatures inside sealed carriages. Others smashed their way out. Many were laid out on the grass by the side of trains when they were eventually rescued.

About 1,000 passengers were left stranded aboard six trains in the Huntingdon area when a 100mph express ripped down two miles of overhead power cables.

After more than two hours of hell trapped on the 14.55 Newcastle to King's Cross train with temperatures soaring, American businesswoman Linda Prudhomme believed fatalities were a serious possibility.

"It was scary," Ms Prudhomme told the Standard. "There were women laid out on the grass at the side of the track. I thought they were going to die.

"There were people coming through the carriage, they were really ill and trying to get out. They were staggering. We were all drenched in sweat.

"We were on the carriage where the drinks trolley was and it was empty within 15 minutes of the train stopping."

When the water ran out, passengers instead resorted to drinking champagne in a desperate attempt to take on any kind of fluid.

Simon Walker, another passenger on the 14:55, said: "They ran out of water and in the end they were giving away everything free.

"I've seen people walking around with bottles of champagne just to get some liquid into them. There were some people suffering quite badly."

Civil servant John Hardman, 58, told of the ordeal suffered by his wife Margaret, 55, who was taken to hospital in an ambulance after fainting. The couple were travelling to London and had boarded the train at York, but it came to a halt just outside Peterborough at about 5.10pm.

Mr Hardman recalled: "They said there was some problem with the power connection, but basically they just left us on the train. The announcements were along the lines of 'There is no progress'. It was just absolutely stifling and they were doing nothing about it.

"I have been out in 120 degrees of heat before and I would say it was hotter than that. It was like a greenhouse.

"About 10 minutes after the train had stopped, everyone was just stifling. My wife was almost fainting and there were people worse than her.

"After about two hours, I went down and asked the chief ticket collector if he could do something because people were unwell. There were no windows to open on the train and they kept saying that they couldn't open the doors.

"By this stage Margaret was feeling very faint and ill so I phoned the police by dialling 999. Someone else phoned the transport police and someone phoned the rail company.

"Eventually people started breaking the little glass emergency panels by the door. There's a little lever inside there and it lets you open the door; people were opening the door just to let some air in. They didn't get off at that stage, they just let some air in."

As the train remained stuck on the tracks in the middle of cornfields, the Hardmans began to fear for their health and were convinced fellow passengers might die.

Mr Hardman added: "After about 30 minutes nothing had happened so I phoned the police again.

"The policeman said he had received a lot of calls about this and a short while later the fire brigade and paramedics arrived. Eventually we were told we could get off and people started jumping down clear of the tracks.

"It was about 8.15pm when we got off the train. There were people being treated at the side of the tracks. I saw two being treated with oxygen and another person looked like he was having some sort of diabetic problem.

"I was honestly concerned that it might get to the position where somebody might die. It was that bad."

Passenger Michael Steed, 70, said: "It was dreadful. People were fainting and repeatedly pulling the emergency cord.

"Eventually a woman having a panic attacked grabbed an emergency hammer and broke through a window and they opened the doors."

Heather Moger, 38, was travelling on a service from Peterborough to Huntingdon with her husband Peter, 40, and son David, 11, when her train stopped.

"I got on the 17.17 from Peterborough," said Mrs Moger, who lives in Godmanchester, Cambridgeshire. "After less than 10 minutes the train stopped at Conington. They said some power lines had gone down at St Neots so all the trains were stopping. We eventually got off at 8pm.

"The fire brigade came and put a ladder up to the door and opened it, then they made a path across the track for us and we all walked to a level crossing.

"There was a very, very good spirit among all the passengers. Everybody was telling stories and looking after each other. The train driver had a bottle of water, which he was sharing out among the little ones and the old people."

Judith Wood, a television producer, was critical of train company GNER, and was astounded when train officials banned her from giving water to her pet Corgi.

Ms Wood, 28, who lives in King's Cross, had caught a train from Edinburgh at 4pm, but it ground to a halt at Peterborough station at 9.30pm - several hours late and many miles from home. She said: "There was no air conditioning on our train so it was very uncomfortable, and it was stopping at every station for about 15 minutes so they could open the doors and let air in.

"There were hundreds of people at Peterborough train station when we arrived because trains were backed up there. There was no one from the rail firm around to offer any help. It was terrible. We saw ambulances arriving back carrying people who had been stuck on the train farther down the line. I shall certainly be complaining. I shall want my fare back and then some."

Elsewhere across the national network other trains were reduced to a crawl because of the heat.

Network Rail, responsible for the tracks and signals, ordered speed restrictions as low as 20mph amid fears that tracks could buckle in the heat, derailing a train.

Three of the four lines closed after last night's incident reopened today, but not soon enough to prevent huge disruption for thousands of commuters into King's Cross.

Services on the three lines resumed shortly before 7 am - but there were severe knock-on delays. The fourth line was expected to reopen later.