Five rail networks meet where disaster struck

Press, 20 November 1987, Page 10

Five rail networks meet where disaster struck

NZPA-AAP London Kings Cross railway and Underground station was a disaster area on Wednesday night (London time). The disaster, it could be said, had been waiting to happen.

A warren of underground tunnels stretches hundreds of metres, and at Kings Cross and the adjoining St Pancras Station no fewer than five lines meet — the Piccadilly, Victoria, Northern, Metropolitan and Circle networks. The Northern Line is so notorious for failures in the electrified lines and overcrowding that it is dubbed “the Misery Line.” AAP reported as recently as July this year,

that London’s Underground railway system is rapidly approaching saturation point, like Tokyo, with one station closed recently to prevent passengers falling on to the track. That station was The Angel, two kilometres from central London; one kilometre from Kings Cross — and on the beleagured Northern Line. The Underground’s worst disaster occurred on the Circle/Metropoli-

tan line, three kilometres away at Moorgate in February, 1975, when a tube train ran into a dead-end tunnel, killing 43 people. Passengers often queue six-deep on platforms above electrified rails and all but the more determined commuters regularly forgo four or five trains at peak hours because there is no room to board.

snake-like pedestrian tunnels extending up to 500 m in length and all terminating in escalators to surface level. In this case, with fire in the escalator and the ground level concourse itself, that route was not only blocked, but pumping fire and choking, blinding smoke on those trapped below. A deputy-chief firemen, Mike Doherty, told AAP at the scene on Wednesday night, “We have removed 20 to 30 casualties

in various stages of injury — mainly smoke inhalation, but some are burned.”

“Fifty fire fighters are continuing the search to make sure there are no further casualties... there are very many nooks and crannies to be searched.

“But as far as we know, all casualties have been removed. Reports that 30 may still be trapped may or may not be true.”

In event of an emergency, there is usually only one route out —