PALIN MITENK BLOG

By Tom Kelly and Peter Allen

Rescue: Passangers cram onto the train used to pick up the people from The Disney Express


Up to 50,000 passengers were stranded on both sides of the Channel on Sunday after Eurostar cancelled all services indefinitely.

Furious travellers called for the operator’s boss to quit after he admitted he did not know when trains would run again.

The chaos followed the unprecedented scenes on Friday night when six trains broke down in the Channel Tunnel.

There were claims of double standards in dealing with the aftermath as 500 ‘vulnerable’ passengers stranded in London were taken to Dover for ferry connections to France and Belgium – but no similar move was made for Britons on the Continent.

More than 2,000 passengers were trapped in horrendous conditions for up to 16 hours on Friday after the trains they were on suffered electrical failures. The mass disruption has ruined the Christmas plans for thousands more.

In other developments on Sunday night Eurostar announced it would not take any more bookings until after Christmas and that when the trains do eventually run again there is expected to be a mass scramble for places after the company said all services will be offered on a ‘first come, first served’ basis. Some passengers stranded in London were advised their best chance of getting to Europe was to take an overnight ferry from Hull – 150 miles north of Eurostar’s London terminal.

At St Pancras in London, the operator made arrangements to move 500 of its ‘most vulnerable’ passengers to Paris in the early afternoon. The elderly and those with children were taken to Dover by train before continuing their journey to the Continent by ferry and coaches.

But desperate Britons stuck in Gare du Nord in the French capital said no reciprocal arrangement had been made for them.


Eurostar staff hand out hot drinks and sandwiches to passengers after the train service was cancelled at St Pancras Station


Paris’s Eurostar terminal was in chaos as thousands of passengers milled around in freezing temperatures.

‘We don’t know where to turn,’ said Ian Banks, a 51-year-old accountant from Croydon, who was travelling with his wife and two children. ‘Following all the trouble on Saturday we knew things would be slow, but this is proving ridiculous.

'Queues are stretching for miles and there’s very little information to be had.’

Student Graham Lee, 22, from Basildon in Essex, said he was fast running out of money and was relying on friends to put him up in Paris.

‘The worst thing is the lack of information,’ he said. ‘Nobody seems to have a clue what’s going on. One minute we’re offered a place on an emergency train home, and the next minute it’s taken away.

‘There’s talk of special trains for old people and young families, but nothing seems to happen.’

Claire McKinney Williams, who is 35 weeks pregnant and unable to fly, was stranded at a hotel in Brussels.

She told the BBC: ‘We haven’t had any help, we’ve been over to Eurostar in the station, and they’ve not been very helpful, they haven’t given us any help on alternative ways home or anything.’


A woman cries as passengers are told that that all Eurostar trains are cancelled, at London's St. Pancras station


At St Pancras, Eurostar closed its ticket office in the morning leaving most travellers to learn their fate from automatic tannoy announcements or from other disgruntled passengers stuck at the station.

Retired engineer Malvin Holland, from Ashford in Kent, said he was ‘furious’ about Eurostar’s response and demanded the resignation of the firm’s boss, Richard Brown.

The 65-year-old from Ashford, Kent, spent nearly £3,000 on a planned eightday holiday to the Harz mountains in Germany with his wife Elizabeth.

He said: ‘This was meant to be the first leg of the trip but it’s all gone wrong already. The chief executive of Eurostar should resign or be sacked.

‘It gets cold in Britain and France in the winter, so these sort of conditions should not come as any surprise.’

A group of Brazilian schoolchildren huddled together for warmth as they sat on the freezing concourse for the second day running. The ten teenagers, from Fortaleza, in north-west Brazil, arrived at St Pancras at 4am on Saturday and waited for most of the day before their teacher found them accommodation in a budget hotel. They returned to the station at 4am on Sunday to discover there were still no trains.

Pupil Ana Carolina said: ‘England is famous around the world for being cold so why should trains stop because of a bit of snow? In other cold countries they manage to keep the trains running.’

John Williams, a 22-year-old student from London trying to get to Germany to spend Christmas with his girlfriend’s family was told either to fly, or take a ferry from Hull.

‘They said we could get a refund but that was it,’ he said. ‘No one has even offered us a cup of coffee or anything.’

Nirj Deva, Conservative MEP for the South East of England, also called for Mr Brown to quit because of Eurostar’s ‘astonishing incompetence’.


Rescue mission: An engine pushes a broken-down train away from the Channel Tunnel after the big freeze caused chaos for trains


A series of special trains had been planned on Saturday night to transport some of those delayed by the chaos but only one – destined for Paris – left because of the bad weather.

Another special service from Paris to London broke down after it came out of the Channel Tunnel.

There were also claims of special treatment for the German supermodel Claudia Schiffer, who was on one of the stranded trains but was reportedly allowed to be picked up by car when other passengers were not let off.

Mr Brown told BBC News: ‘What’s important at the moment is to get the service back and to really understand what happened and learn the lessons.

'We will not start services again until we’re sure that we can get them through safely.'




source: dailymail