'All I heard was sobbing'

Another Sunday morning, another Tube journey. André "choombee was on his way to work at his lighting shop. In the next carriage Subash Dangol was reading the papers. Mohammed Ishrat was on his way to work, too, and worrying whether he was going to be late.

As the Northern line train approached Camden Town, Mr Schoombee, 28, checked his watch. It was 9.56am.

Suddenly he felt the train jolt sharply. He was thrown back in his seat and heard fellow passengers scream as they were flung across the carriage.

"The train started shaking," said Mr Schoombee, who lives in Walthamstow. "I was sure we had jumped the rail. There was this screeching - and the carriage lights were flashing on and off. It was surreal. People were being thrown on the floor. It felt like the roller coaster ride from hell."

As the train came to a halt Mr Schoombee's carriage - second from the end - was plunged into darkness. "The aftermath was worse," he said. "There was this awful burning smell and the carriage was thick with dust. All I could hear was muffled sobbing from a teenage girl next to me."

As panic threatened to grip the passengers, Mr Schoombee took control: he had served six years with the South African police.

"I tried to calm people and told them to sit back in their seats. Nobody seemed badly hurt. I was really worried about a fire. I knew if there was one, we were all cooked."

Mr Schoombee felt it was only a matter of time before the emergency services would make an announcement.

"I told the group they would probably advise us to walk from carriage to carriage until we got to one that was in the station."

But the announcement never came. Nearly 10 minutes later and acting on his own initiative, Mr Schoombee led the frightened-group through the train. When they reached the platform, he saw a lone guard shouting down his radio: "The brake pads flew off the f***ing thing."

"We couldn't see any other LU people apart from the train driver and she looked traumatised," explained Mr Schoombee. "When we finally got outside it was the same. Nothing. Not an emergency service in sight. I couldn't believe it."

On the fourth carriage further up the train sat Parna Singh, 21, and her partner Subash Dangol, 24, who run a Nepalese arts and crafts stall in Camden Market and commute from Lewisham. Mr Dangol was reading an article about Osama bin Laden just before the train derailed.

"There was this massive brake jam," he said. "Then this horrible screeching. I fell on top of Parna. Terrorists, derailment or fire, it was all spinning in my mind.

"Our carriage went dark and people just started running towards the light from further up the train. Parna was shaking and I kept telling her to stay calm."

Holding hands tightly, the couple walked through two carriages before reaching one which had made it into the station platform. "I just took a really deep breath when we got outside," said Ms Singh. "I thought we were both more than lucky."

Mohammed Ishrat, 34, from Leyton, who runs a jewellery stall in Camden High Street, also described the moment the train derailed. "Everyone fell forward," he said. "One lady banged her head. I was trying to comfort her, she was really upset. You read about terrorist attacks, nobody wanted to say it but everyone was thinking it."

Immediately after the lights went out, Mr Ishrat said, the driver made an announcement asking everyone to stay calm.

"After about 10 minutes she announced that they were able to open two of the doors. When we got out it was chaos outside the station, people were crying and hugging each other."