Car train canceled
“Like in the disaster film”: Hundreds of passengers are stuck in the Eurotunnel for hours
After the breakdown, the Autozug passengers had to leave their cars in the Eurotunnel and were escorted through the emergency tunnel on foot
© Kate Scott / DPA
After a breakdown in the Eurotunnel, hundreds of passengers had to wait for hours in a car train. They were later evacuated. A video on social media shows people, some with luggage and dogs, apparently having to go through a maintenance tunnel.
Passengers on a car train from Calais in France had to wait for hours in the Eurotunnel. Shortly before 4 p.m. on Tuesday, there was a breakdown that prevented the train from continuing its journey. As British media reports, the train was on its way to the British town of Folkestone.
According to the Daily Mail, one of the passengers on board later reported to the British news agency PA that ten minutes after boarding the train, the lights went out and the train stopped. “We were told they needed to investigate a problem with the wheels,” the man is quoted as saying. After about an hour and a half the train would have started moving again, but after five minutes it would have stopped again. “We waited another two hours until they decided they couldn’t find a problem and we had to change to another train.”
Trapped in the Eurotunnel: Twitter video shows passengers being evacuated
Finally, the passengers were routed through the emergency connection tunnel to the service tunnel, where another replacement train was waiting for them.
Passengers had to wait several hours on the train
©Michael Harrison/DPA
A video on Twitter showed people, some with luggage and dogs, apparently walking through a maintenance tunnel.
“We then walked about ten minutes to a train that was in front of the affected train,” the man continued. “That took us to Folkestone. We finally got there six hours after boarding.”
The evacuation caused great discomfort among some passengers. “The maintenance tunnel was scary. It was like something out of a disaster movie,” a 37-year-old passenger told the PA. “We just went into the abyss not knowing what was going to happen. We all had to wait in this long line under the sea.” One woman cried, another had a panic attack.
The Eurotunnel is the world’s longest underwater tunnel and runs between Folkestone in Kent (UK) and Coquelles near Calais (France). Of the 50 kilometers, 37 kilometers run completely under the English Channel. Connections were lost because of the incident. The train operator told passengers traveling from Calais to Folkestone not to show up at the terminal until 6am on Wednesday.
Watch the video: The “High Speed 2” railway line is to connect London with the British midlands. Construction machines like the 2,000-ton “Dorothy” bore tunnels that are kilometers long.
Sources: “Daily Mail”, BBC, Twitterwith material from the DPA