please empty your brain below
I think bragging rights go to that member of the public who travelled from Abbey Wood to Paddington in November, having walked through a gate left open by staff.

Still Anon | 14.02.22 - 7:15 a.m. | #

I was saying to friends only the other day that it must be really difficult to get to be a volunteer for Crossrail testing, because even DG hadn’t managed it. I spoke too soon…

Baldassaro | 14.02.22 - 7:20 a.m. | #

I got my own smug bragging rights by visiting Woolwich and walking through the tunnel under the Thames before they put tracks in it, so I'm delighted to see what the station looks like now. The tiled escalator void is very pleasing.

Scott | Homepage | 14.02.22 - 7:39 a.m. | #

Being invited to an exclusive event because of your online activity/connections. Does that make you an "influencer"?

Marco | 14.02.22 - 7:58 a.m. | #

I'm curious as to whether they used the situation to test out what the controllers do with the rest of the line line at the same - whether they try to keep parts of it moving by using available turn-backs or stopping the whole lot.

NickW | 14.02.22 - 8:16 a.m. | #

When I saw brief coverage of this exercise on the local BBC news last night, my first thought was: "I bet I know what DG will blog about tomorrow"

Frank F | 14.02.22 - 8:24 a.m. | #

To get best learning from the event they should have included one or more "passengers" with reduced mobility. (Or someone so pretending). Of course they may have done so, but as a random passenger, you would not necessarily have seen how any such people got on.

Malcolm of Kent | 14.02.22 - 8:43 a.m. | #

I was once on a plane in which the toilets had stopped working. Apparently they are allowed to fly for one hour in that condition, but that evidently did not include the extra 90 minutes sitting on the runway trying to fix it and to decide what to do next. I wonder whether trains and other captive situations have rules for this.

kev | 14.02.22 - 9:08 a.m. | #

I was lucky enough to get a place on a similar exercise when Eurostar was shifting its terminal from Waterloo to the new St Pancras International station.

We were all issued with lanyards and tickets to Paris, in order to test the embarkation processes. We eventually made it onto a train and travelled all the way to Stratford International and back for disembarkation. Twice, if I recall correctly.

So my bragging rights to have travelled through the new tunnel were tempered by the fact that the Paris tickets got us no further than Stratford !

Petras409 | 14.02.22 - 9:08 a.m. | #

At least the photos of Custom House show that you can still make an attractive station on a budget. I went through St.Pancras Intl for the first time in several months the other day and it really is depressing how they couldn't be bothered with even the slightest decoration. Especially as a gateway to the city for travellers.

Chz | 14.02.22 - 9:17 a.m. | #

There is a YouTube video of the trip from Abbey wood to Westbourne Park. It shows the Connaught tunnel as unlit, other tunnels are well lit.

Fred | 14.02.22 - 9:21 a.m. | #

Thanks indeed to the member of staff who invited you so that we could enjoy this report!

commonliner | 14.02.22 - 9:51 a.m. | #

Having been on several similar exercises I do wonder how realistic they are as everyone is on their best behaviour and expecting to spend several hours underground. A few participants will have been asked to play certain roles (there probably was at least one wheelchair user and I was once asked to play blind) but in a real situation passengers will have appointments to meet, some will just be belligerent and no-one will have been warned to go to the loo before making what they expect to be a short journey. It could all turn unpleasant quite quickly.

Andrew S | 14.02.22 - 10:10 a.m. | #

they've built walls either side of the track to block the view

Actually, they did that to protect it in case the Thames flooded - but I expect you knew that really.

Pedantic of Purley | 14.02.22 - 10:28 a.m. | #

Disappointing that they didn't open this up to the public like Eurostar did for St Pancras or Heathrow did for T5 and T2.

No doubt Covid will be used as the half hearted excuse for why they didn't. Pretty pathetic, really.

Jordan D | 14.02.22 - 10:34 a.m. | #

Andrew S. l agree, l’m booked to go on one of these where a large number of ‘passengers’ are made to travel between Paddington and Tottenham Court Road four times. I’m tempted to ‘collapse’ in one of the train/PED doorways at some point.

Kim | 14.02.22 - 10:47 a.m. | #

A fascinating read, but I'm glad you did it and not me!

Mikey C | 14.02.22 - 11:04 a.m. | #

What we don't know is whether the exercise was regarded as a success or not.

It certainly seems to have taken much longer than one would have expected given that one would expect a plan to be in place within half an hour and, presumably, trained staff at Custom House station would have been available to assist.

If it was deemed not satisfactory, will it be repeated?

Like others I am concerned about the lack of realistic potential additional incidents (wheelchair users, parents with children etc) but hope that the objective on the first test was just to do a straightforward evacuation with the challenges added on later in the programme.

Pedantic of Purley | 14.02.22 - 11:50 a.m. | #

I’d advise against drawing conclusions based on things I didn’t mention.

diamond geezer | Homepage | 14.02.22 - 11:59 a.m. | #

I did the St Pancras International trials too - I seem to remember the reward was an actual return ticket to Paris to use at a later date. (Heathrow T5 and T2 trials only had goodie bags.)

martin | 14.02.22 - 12:12 p.m. | #

Driver's request for competent people to "assist with de-training" could perhaps be reworded so as not to rubbish the training already received.

Ian | 14.02.22 - 3:17 p.m. | #

I guess this means that the number of times you departed on an elizabeth line train will never be the same as the number of times you've arrived in an elizabeth line train.

rather like how skydivers do more take-offs than landings

Alistair Twin | 14.02.22 - 3:40 p.m. | #

Oh how fun - at least to read about from the comfort of my living room that is!!

Well done to all who sacrificed their Sunday for collective connection.

Cornish Cockney | 14.02.22 - 4:01 p.m. | #

Chuffed to spot myself in the first photo of a DG post, though admittedly hard to miss given what I'm wearing!

Hope all involved had a fun and very unique experience, I wasn't quite expecting the moment of trepidation when climbing down the wooden ladder.

(I, of course, did wait to go back to Woolwich, but then again by the time we got off it wasn't THAT long to wait! I can report it's normally much much much faster than three hours.)

RAVS | 14.02.22 - 5:54 p.m. | #

I did a similar excercise before the tram opened. It felt very real being trapped in tbe tunnel.

Cornish Monkey | 14.02.22 - 7:06 p.m. | #

I took part yesterday and enjoyed the overall experience. It did seem to take a while to be evacuated but I understand that protocols must be followed.

So not only was Geoff Marshall there yesterday (and I got the chance to chat with him), but the legend that is dg was blogging about the experience too. Would’ve been nice to have been able to say hello. Maybe one day!

Rob Healy | Homepage | 14.02.22 - 7:25 p.m. | #

somebody I know who is a guide dog user often takes part in these exercises, the dog behaves perfectly. He'd probably need help with the ladder though.

amber | 14.02.22 - 8:42 p.m. | #

Kudos, very cool for someone to send you an invite.

What a way to spend a Sunday morning though, can’t imagine what party24/7 2002 DG would have made of that.

The purple fabric weave on the seats does look very nice.

Kevin | 14.02.22 - 9:17 p.m. | #

I'm unclear what's being learnt from having 400 people in the exercise. It must be known how long it takes to get 400 people down a ladder and walk x'00 yards.

RogerB | 14.02.22 - 9:32 p.m. | #

Thanks Martin. Yes, I had forgotten about the free tickets as a reward. We did get to the 'real' Paris later on !

Petras409 | 14.02.22 - 10:26 p.m. | #

Evacuation was far too slow. Also would be more realistic to give some a couple of beers before the start! and have someone simulate having a panic attack.
Think after an hour people would start opening the doors and jumping down.

Tony | 18.02.22 - 10:25 a.m. | #











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