Eurostar suspended. At least 55,000 travellers affected

22 DEC 2009:  The only rail link between Britain and France was closed indefinitely Sunday as Eurostar investigated a series of train breakdowns that trapped thousands of people in the Channel Tunnel for hours. Eurostar originally said that four of its trains were halted in the tunnel Friday evening. On Sunday the company said a fifth train had also been disabled in the tunnel before being towed to London. A sixth train broke down Friday, although outside the tunnel, 38 kilometres of which sits under the English Channel, Eurostar said.

Following unsuccessful attempts to move some passengers between London and Paris on Saturday evening, the company cancelled all services ``until we get to the bottom of what happened Friday night,'' Eurostar chief executive Richard Brown said.

``We will not start services again until we are sure we can get them through safely,'' he told BBC television. ``We want to understand what it was that caused this unprecedented breakdown.''

He added that normal services might not return for days. The company said it had taken the precautionary step of cancelling all ticket sales until after Christmas.

Not a pleasant journey

Trapped Eurostar passengers spoke of being left in the dark for up to 16 hours without adequate food, water or any clear idea of what was happening. Some reportedly suffered asthma and panic attacks.

While most of the trains were towed out, two had to be evacuated, forcing passengers to walk through sections of the darkened tunnel.

French European parliamentarian Dominique Baudis, who was travelling from Paris to London on one of the trains that broke down, said the trip from took 12-13 hours, including six hours in a train inside the tunnel.

Passengers were ``without water, without any information and without any help provided to the most vulnerable passengers. There were many children aboard, small children including some just a few months old. There were also elderly people who had trouble getting around,'' he told France-Info radio. ``It's absolutely inconceivable.''

Brown seemed to acknowledge that there were some problems on at least one train but defended his staff.

``I'm not pretending it went well. I think it went quite a bit better than people say,'' he said.

The company is running special trains through the tunnels in a bid to pinpoint the problem, press officer Anelle Mouhaddib said Sunday, with results of engineers' tests expected later Sunday.

Earlier, officials blamed the problems on the quick transition from the icy cold of France, which is suffering some of its worst winter weather in years, to the relative warmth of the tunnel, which could have produced condensation and interfered with the trains' electrical systems. But the exact cause remains unclear.

Eurostar's executives have offered refunds and free travel to those affected by the latest cancellations.