BREAKS IN TWO

Taranaki Daily News, 7 October 1931, Page 13

BREAKS IN TWO

MISHAP TO BOAT TRAIN. TUNNEL ADVENTURE. Hundreds of passengers on the Ostend boat train were marooned for nearly an hour in the darkness of Penge tunnel recently. Owing to the breaking of a coupling the train split in two, and traffic between London and Penge was held up during the rush hours. A passenger in the portion of the train which remained in the tunnel after the break gave a graphic story of the occurrence when he arrived at Victoria two hours after the scheduled time of the boat train’s arrival. i “We were about 200 yards into the tunnel,” he said, “when we felt the automatic brakes being applied. Suddenly the carriages stopped, and we discovered that the engine and two or three coaches had gone on, leaving the rest of us in the tunnel. We waited for some time, and then were drawn back to the entrance to the tunnel—(Penge East Station. “After further delay we were again pushed, this time right through the tunnel, where a light engine picked us up and brought us to town. The train, which should have arrived at 5.15, got in at 7.10.” The breakdown caused considerable delay to thousands of workers homeward bound. For over two hours the local services from the city to Beckenham, Bromley, and Orpington had to be worked through the Catford loop line.