Passengers’ fury at nine-hour rail nightmare
A group of rail passengers are furious after a nightmare journey from Southampton to London took a mammoth nine hours yesterday.
A combination of buckled rails, speed restrictions, a death on the line and breakdowns left 100 passengers stranded in a single carriage train for three hours in the stifling heat.
Temperatures soared over 30 degrees C as the 70-mile trip was plagued with delays.
The journey started in Hampshire when the service was delayed after a rail worker slipped on a live line in Basingstoke and died.
The train left Southampton Parkway at 0922 BST and arrived in Waterloo at 1820 BST. However it was forced to stop at Micheldever, near Winchester, for one and a half hours.
The train was then re-routed via Havant, but only got as far as Eastleigh before stopping again.
At Romsey, passengers were asked to disembark and wait for another train. When the train arrived it was a single carriage service, desperate passengers ignored the driver’s warning that there were too many people on the train, and 100 passengers squeezed on.
The train stopped ten minutes after leaving Romsey and remained stationary for three hours.
Passengers, including elderly people and a pregnant woman were left without water, and complained that the driver locked himself in his cupboard.
One passenger was forced to smash an emergency exit to let in some air after the driver refused to open the doors.
After three hours the train finally reached Salisbury, where passengers were given water by rail staff, six hours after their journey began.
South West Trains spokeswoman Jane Lee said yesterday: “Sadly, some passengers today were absolutely dogged by misfortune.
“They managed to catch everything that was going today. We have met as many passengers as we can at Waterloo Station in London to hand out water and refunds.”
The fatality, which claimed the life of a 29-year-old rail worker caused massive delays and the Waterloo service then became stuck behind a failed freight train, Ms Lee explained.
Problems were also compounded by buckled rails and speed restrictions caused by the weather.
