Every case is different for various and obvious reasons. The industry is a heck of a lot more aware of the issues than in the past. There will no doubt be a review on this one , I know - I have chaired a few o them when we did not perform as well as we should have , in the past.
Spot on - some of the evacuations even today have been much quicker than others (the evacuation of 9K39 has been particularly entertaining - reports of just one person onboard!).
I think emergency response performance today around the major cities has been pretty much as good as resources have allowed,
given the extreme circumstances. A lot of people have been very uncomfortable or stranded, but so far, it doesn't seem that there's much evidence that the industry could have worked any more quickly. VT were "well on the way" with the process of arranging rescue trains for the Euston/Camden incident within less than 5 minutes of the issue having occurred.
Surprisingly, from my observations there were quite a few family day outs to London in progress. Bet a few of these may be regretting it now.
Some people just won't listen, or have no idea that it's a good idea to check before travelling. Still a bonkers idea to voluntarily go into London today, though.
Few thunderstorms into the evening as well and I'd guess all bets for tomorrow are looking dicey.
Yes, that's my concern as well. I doubt much of this will be fully fixed before tomorrow morning's peak if the weather worsens and staff can't work at height.
It's all going completely wrong all over - definitely a case of avoid if possible. Traincrews now refusing to work on trains with failed/no air con as on board temperatures are over 40 degrees. GA 170s all stood down as they're unable to cope with the heat (always been an issue with this class of unit).
I've been working on a class 156 this afternoon and I feel physically sick.
I sympathise. Turbostars are grim places for train crew on a summer's day. But it does seem most fleets are affected. Some of the 700s - meant to have been tested for the most extreme weather conditions - are getting so warm that people are being physically sick.
Fires were still burning when I was evacuated about 25-30 minutes ago.
I was told the fires were being extinguished at about that point. Evidently it was a slower process than originally thought possible!