Platform at Coventry station closed - by a pair of trousers

[dutchman]

A platform was put out of action at Coventry railway station this morning - by a pair of trousers.



It made for a ''pants'' morning for commuters with a whole platform closed for about an hour.

At 9.01am, Virgin Trains tweeted that an obstruction on the overhead lines above platform 3 meant that train services were subject to delays and changes.

Half an hour later, another tweet told travellers that the obstruction was still in place, and that they may continue to face changes and hold-ups on their journeys.

By 10am, it was announced in a tweet that the obstruction was of an unusual nature: “We’re trying to work out how a pair of trousers managed to get on the overheads, they should be removed by 10.30 when Platform 3 reopens!”

A Virgin Trains’ Coventry customer service manager called Dotty later said: “We have no idea how the trousers got up there in the first place.

“Sadly, we haven’t seen anybody running around half naked - although we have been looking.

“Network Rail came and they had to take the power out of the lines so they could safely remove the offending item.

“Since they’re 25,000 volt lines, they couldn’t have removed the trousers without cutting the power, or they’d have been hot pants.

“The workmen used a litter-picker to reach up nine feet to take them off.

“I don’t know exactly how many trains were delayed, but I know that around 10 trains would have been affected in the hour and a half that it took to remove the trousers.

“Since I put up the tweets this morning, I’ve had a few responses over Twitter.

“Some people saying, ‘That’s the best excuse we’ve ever heard’, and others saying, ‘We’re used to trains being delayed because of leaves on the line, but not trousers!’

Virgin Trains staff are offering to ‘reunite’ the trousers with their owner, although the British Transport Police have also been made aware of the incident.

A Telegraph investigation later discovered the offending garment was a pair of jogging bottoms.

A spokesman for Network Rail sent the Telegraph this statement: “We were alerted to a pair of trousers on the overhead lines at Coventry station at 9am.

“The obstruction meant trains were unable to use platform 3.

“We removed the trousers and normal working resumed at 10.03am.”

[rebbonk]

Don't trains use a 'pantograph' to pick up the power from the lines?