Great Western Coffee Shop

SCORES of reckless rail passengers risked their lives by halting a train and walking along the track.

A group of disgruntled rail users decided to pull the emergency stop cord after hearing the 2.35pm First Great Western service from Avonmouth to Bristol Temple Meads would not stop at Redland station on Saturday.

Network Rail said that passengers were told that the station was too busy to stop at.

Angry at this change to the timetable, an unknown passenger halted the train a short distance out of Clifton Down station.

Up to 200 people got out of the carriage and started walking along the track back to the Clifton stop.

Julian Burnell from Network Rail said: "This is a very rare and very serious incident.

"In the seven years I have worked at Network Rail, this is the first time I have heard of such an incident taking place."

The company call this type of event an "uncontrolled evacuation" and it has the potential to cause fatal accidents.

Mr Burnell said: "It is extremely dangerous, even on a quiet railway like this one.

"Thankfully it is not an electric line, the outcome could have been very different."

It is understood that no one was injured during the walk -off and that everyone got back to Clifton Down Station safely.

British Transport Police (BTP) officers were called to the scene and helped escort passengers off the line.

A spokesman from BTP said: "We are treating this as a trespass incident ^ one which caused numerous delays to services in the area and could have put lives in danger ^ and inquiries are currently underway to identify those involved."

A spokesperson from First Great Western said that the train company is also carrying out investigations in to the incident.

In a statement, First Great Western said: "Railway lines are designed for trains, not people and are inherently dangerous places.

"The actions of this group of passengers, whatever their reasons, endangered not only themselves, but also their fellow passengers.

"We will be investigating."

The walk-off caused long delays on the line and normal service was not resumed until past 6pm

The reason the train was so busy was because there was a big festival in Eastville park.. I have a photo of how packed it was at Clifton station as I was there. That train must have been unbearably rammed.. Maybe dangerously rammed. That is why it wasn't stopping at Redland and the latter trains were badly delayed.. I ended up walking from Clifton to Lawrence Hill!

Mr Burnell said: "It is extremely dangerous, even on a quiet railway like this one..."

Presumably the main danger would come from a northbound train that had SPADed after Redland station? Or perhaps from falling down the steps? Or maybe a wasp?

Edit: Reading the article at http://epigram.org.uk/news/2015/09/chaos-on-train-to-tokyo-world suggests that possibly the cord was pulled at some point after the train was halted.

Crazy.............well at least rugby fans behave themselves when the trains fall over!

You are a cynic.

If that is the case sounds like they stopped at the red signal after departing Clifton Down station, maybe the signaller stopping the train to tell the driver not to call at Redland(?), dangerous really as stopping there would indicate perhaps waiting a train to come off the single line.

These people are supposed to be the cream of intellectuality!

From Epigram, University of Bristol Independent Student Newspaper (http://epigram.org.uk/news/2015/09/chaos-on-train-to-tokyo-world)

Chaos ensued between Clifton Down and Redland Station yesterday as students travelling to Tokyo World pulled the emergency alarm to escape a severely overcrowded train.

Students were forced to jump from the train and walk along the tracks in order to get back to the platform.

The incident occurred on the 14:48 train to Stapleton Road, as students travelled to attend the popular music festival Tokyo World. An estimated 150 to 200 students attempted to get on-board the two-carriage train at Clifton Down station, which was then kept waiting at the station for approximately fifteen minutes.

The train eventually left the platform, only to be stopped between Clifton Down and Redland stations for approximately twenty-five minutes due to further overcrowding at Redland Station.

A third-year Computer Scientist told Epigram that ^No one knew what was going on, the driver made an announcement over the tannoy but no one could really hear it.^

The initially jovial atmosphere turned to fear as students inside the severely overcrowded train began to panic and chant ^Let us off, let us off!^

Describing her experience on-board the train, a third-year History student told Epigram, ^It was awful, I was trapped in the corner. I^m claustrophobic so I started panicking and I felt like I couldn^t breathe. People around us were shouting to the guys nearest to the window to smash it open.^

One student jumped into the overhead luggage storage shelf to avoid the mass of people.

The emergency alarm was then pulled, and students jumped a metre from the train onto the tracks. A female student was seen lying by the side of the track after fainting and having a panic attack on-board the train.

One Aerospace Engineer told Epigram how he had to divert the crowd of people jumping off the train away from the ill student, fearing that she might be trampled.

He then described how students ran away from police officers as they walked down the tracks towards the train, causing many students to scramble up a bank and over a fence rather than walk back to the platform.

A third-year Economics student described the event as ^totally surreal.^

Another third-year Physicist said, ^m glad we all got out when we did. The train driver should have either realised there were too many people and kicked us off at Clifton, or carried on to the next station before stopping.^

Speaking to Epigram, Julian Burnell of Network Rail said ^these individuals put themselves and others at great risk, and inconvenienced hundreds of other people. The railway is a hazardous environment, which is why railway trespass is a criminal offence, carrying a maximum fine of ^1,000. We will be assisting the British Transport Police in their enquiries.^

Since appearing in Epigram this story has been picked up by the Bristol Post  who have lambasted ^scores of reckless rail passengers^, while The Guardian has acknowledged the plight of those on-board but still claims passengers only left the train ^after discovering it would miss [the] next station.^

These people are supposed to be the cream of intellectuality!

No. They're learning to be the cream. A few more years study and they may just get there. That is if they haven't been wiped out by a passing Class 150.

But, it must be remembered that it's not only the cream that floats to the top...

The PA system on a train is a vital piece of safety equipment and I would hope that any enquiry examines whether it was used to full effect. 

I have been on countless trains where the PA system may as well not have been there. I even remember sitting in the quiet carriage and not hearing what was being said because the volume was so poor.

I hope you pass the information on to the driver/TM - they always seem very receptive when I have informed them I couldn't hear them, one driver a few years ago was very pleased, said he would repeat it again speaking louder and asked me to let him know if i could hear that or not (which I couldn't).