London To Eastbourne Train Hell

At least I know why my train to Eastbourne was running late on Monday...

One of the new "state of the art" South Central Electrostar trains broke down at left passengers stranded for hours.

The 17:45 from London Bridge to Eastbourne should have taken 90 minutes to complete the journey but in the end it took over 5 hours.

The train broke down 15 mintues into the journey and the 600 passengers were given no information from 6pm to 8:45pm when they were eventually taken to another train at East Croydon, which also broke down.

The new trains don't have windows that can be opened and in the heat of the packed train some passengers tried to force the doors so they could get out.

The cockup comes as the new Electrostar trains take too much power from the old "third rail" electrical supply. The new trains have air-conditioning, faster speeds and even electric toilets. Unfortunately this means that they drain too much power and the power supplies in the South East of the country can't take it.

In this instance the drain on the power supply caused cables to burn out, cutting all electricity to the track. It took several hours until the the fault was traced due to the fragmented management of the privatised rail industry. Under the old British Rail one manager would have been in control of both the track and the trains, with the skills to asses much more quickly where the problem was.

With the rebranding of South Central as Southern, they are telling us to "Expect MORE". I hope they don't mean more massive cockups like this.

The BBC and the London Evening Standard are both carrying the story.