French Train Explosion (Training Exercise)

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The French railway operator, SNCF, has mistakenly put a dramatic statement on its website saying more than 100 people had died in a train explosion.

The false announcement, of an explosion in Macon in the Burgundy region, was part of a training exercise.

It was only when journalists began flooding the railway operator's phone lines that the company realised there had been an enormous error.

A real SNCF statement later firmly said that the accident had never happened.

The message, which appeared on the SNCF website shortly after 1100 (1000 GMT), stated that following an explosion on a high-speed TGV train on the Paris to Dijon line, 102 people had been confirmed dead, while 380 people had been injured.

During an in-house training exercise in which staff were asked to respond to a massive rail accident, a staff member had accidentally posted details of the pretend scenario on the official website.

In a statement about the misunderstanding, SNCF explained that it was obliged to practise its emergency procedures for the safety of its passengers.

Sacri Bleu :eek:

Or should that be D'oh

pointofnoreturn

At least we do! know this now practice for such events, and try to re-create the life experiences.
Must be a follow up exercise to the Eurostar problems last Christmas
Can't imagine CIE been able to handle such incidents

xper

This sort of exercise is standard, regular industry practice. And yes, in little old Ireland too. In fact, we can even make the very same mistake. Bus Eireann had a similar experience about five years ago when a press release was issued about a crash on the N11 with fatalities. Got out on the national radio bulletins before it was retracted with an explanation that it was just an exercise to test internal procedures for such an event.

Run_to_da_hills

xper wrote: »

This sort of exercise is standard, regular industry practice. And yes, in little old Ireland too. In fact, we can even make the very same mistake. Bus Eireann had a similar experience about five years ago when a press release was issued about a crash on the N11 with fatalities. Got out on the national radio bulletins before it was retracted with an explanation that it was just an exercise to test internal procedures for such an event.

I can remember that one, but I dont think there was any fatalities

http://www.u.tv/News/N11-bus-crash-was-simulation-says-Bus-Eireann/8458cd3c-8736-45b7-b6d7-70249d81a851

FlameoftheWest

Crazy Orwellian stuff going on there at SNCF with this codology if you ask me.

monument

FlameoftheWest wrote: »

Crazy Orwellian stuff going on there at SNCF with this codology if you ask me.

It's not Orwellian at all.

It happened while there was a practise of its emergency procedures which the company says they are obliged to do. There was just a slip up and the message was published, that's all. And no media outlet following basic rules of journalism would have published the story without first checking it.

IF you want an example of something Orwellian, it would be something like Irish Rail saying a very high percentage of their trains are on time. Or it's train spotters in the UK being stopped under anti-terror laws. But slip ups are not very Orwellian at all.