Eurotunnel passengers were trapped for almost five hours at underwater level after the train broke down under the Channel, leaving hundreds of passengers to be taken to a service tunnel.
The incident happened on Tuesday afternoon and affected the 15.50 Eurotunnel Le Shuttle service from Calais to Folkestone.
Travelers on the service shared their experience on social media, with videos showing people walking through the alternative tunnel alongside the 50km rail route between Britain and France.
Some passengers were carrying suitcases and walking dogs through the tunnel, while travelers on the Calais side were urged to stay away from the terminal until 6am on Wednesday, leading to long queues at the terminal shuttle until Tuesday evening.
A passenger on the evacuated train, Michael Harrison, from Cranbrook, Kent, told PA: “We went up to the crossing at 3.50pm, about 10 minutes into the lights went out and the train stopped. We were to say they had to investigate a problem with the wheels. It took them about an hour and a half to investigate and obviously found nothing.”
“After waiting some more, we exited the train through the emergency link tunnel to the service tunnel. We then walked for about 10 minutes to a train in front of the affected train. Then the train stopped because it could not get traction, presumably because it was long and had no weight.”
Harrison arrived in Folkestone six hours after boarding the train.
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In a statement, a spokesman for Eurotunnel Le Shuttle said: “A train has broken down in the tunnel and we are in the process of transferring customers to a separate passenger shuttle through the service tunnel, to return to our terminal from Folkestone. We apologize for this inconvenience.”