Train Spotted

‘ARE you ready for extreme trainspotting? In this version of the popular sport, daredevil spotters have to collect numbers while the train is actually moving at full pelt between stations.

Neville, Brian and Janet were surprised that they had been able to outpace the train

But spoilsports at South West Trains are onto their little game, and in the interests of health and safety have instructed their drivers to go at an all-time slow.

Just yesterday, as the Times reports, the 9:22 from Southampton Parkway to Waterloo, a 70-mile journey that should take 64 minutes, took nearly nine hours, arriving in London at 6:20pm.

Somewhat unsportingly, the passengers on the train, of which there were roughly 100, were not happy. People like Ron Edwards, who speaks to the Guardian.

”One person smashed open an emergency exit because the guard would not open the doors,” says Mr Edwards, as the temperatures onboard rose.

”We then threatened to get off the train if something wasn’t done. By this time the guard had locked himself in his cupboard.”

Over in the Telegraph, however, the paper has advice as to how Mr Edwards and his fellow commuters could have kept cool – by spitting at each other.

Indeed spitting is something of a craze on the rail network, given how, it seems, so many commuters like doing it, especially when a railway employee’s face is nearby.

And now Central Trains have acted, issuing all their staff with DNA testing kits, which will allow them to preserve the saliva that’s come their way and hand it over for police testing.

While this spells imminent arrest for the likes of Roy Hattersley and Bob Carolgees and his dog Spit, the kit is already being used to identify the body of a man who appears to have melted inside his anorak alongside train tracks near Winchester…

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Posted: 8th, August 2003 | In: Broadsheets Comment | TrackBack | Permalink