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From the BBC (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-37109170)

I was hoping to find the same pictures I've seen on TV, showing what this tree did to the train, as these ones are not as clear:
(http://static.ladepeche.fr/content/media/image/large/2016/08/17/20160817173549011-0.jpg)
(http://france3-regions.francetvinfo.fr/languedoc-roussillon/sites/regions_france3/files/styles/asset_list_medium/public/assets/images/2016/08/17/maxnewsworldfour090237.jpg?itok=vcVm-klf)

If you look closely at the frontal view you can see that big lump of tree inside the cab comes out halfway up on the side. (the interior view is even scarier). The driver threw himself on the floor and escaped serious injury, but he was very shocked by it. And SNCF say the train was not running at its full speed of 140 km/hr due to the weather.

The passenger who was thrown out of the hole in the side of the train is now off the danger list. Having established that, French TV reporting has concentrated on whose tree did it. It was a private tree, standing in a garden next to the line. Thus SNCF are keen to point out it was not their fault. I get the impression that the owner may be strictly liable - i.e. not knowing it was weak is no defence.

The tree was not uprooted - it snapped several metres up (and it was described as a pine 3 m in diameter at the base). That may explain the early reports that it had not snapped the overhead wires, if it was held up at its trunk end. Alternatively, the fact that the violent hailstorm was still going on may mean the tree fell almost exactly as the train arrived.

Definitely the wrong kind of tree on the line.

Very unfortunate, I am sure that we all wish the injured a speedy recovery.

I doubt however that the tree was 3M in diameter as is reported. 3M in circumference perhaps, though even that is extreme for a pine.

I suspect you're right - that's just what I heard on the TV, and why it was quoted that way.

Some of those TV pictures are in the video in this page from FR3 (http://france3-regions.francetvinfo.fr/languedoc-roussillon/herault/montpellier/accident-de-ter-saint-aunes-2-blesses-toujours-hospitalises-1067843.html)).

In any case it's misleading. This wasn't the kind of pine tree with one big straight trunk, it was the Mediterranean kind with a bare trunk and a rounded top. But obviously that's also misleading, if it suggests the top was just a load of little branches.

Most of it fell beside the line (it only damaged one track's OLE), and the train went clean through the bit that was in its way, stopping under the A9 (or the new LGV being built alongside it). So it could have been much worse - if you do look at the video, there's a bit of trunk lying beside the track that is over a metre in diameter.

3 metres diameter at the crown perhaps?

Scary! Glad the passenger is recovering and the driver was uninjured.

But who else clicked on this thinking of a station on the Severn Beach line? (Yes I know that's only one l, but even so... )

Yeah, I did ...

me too

Ne pas moi!

Une réponse pleine d'esprit, comme toujours

(Oh the joy of Google Translate - which works in reverse and is sometimes accurate.)

Gracias penis.


(I used google translate because I don't speak Spanish. Thanks, cock!)