Overview
On 27 June 1988, SNCF commuter train 153944 inbound to Paris’ Gare de Lyon terminal from Melun to the southeast was running its routine 50-mile journey, using one of SNCF’s electric multiple units, Class Z 5300. However, as the train neared Paris, it passed the Vert de Maisones station, which was usually a stop on the route. However, SNCF had recently implemented a new summer timetable, which meant train 153944 no longer stopped at the station.
As the train pulled past the platform, a passenger in the second car of the train suddenly stood up, pulled the emergency brake, and left the train. Driver Daniel Saulin, assisted by Guard Jean Charles Boveé, after working for 20 minutes, reset the brakes and continued. This procedure had taken longer than usual, prompting many passengers to leave the train. To make up the lost time, the station controller at Gare de Lyon, André Tollance, instructed Saulin to skip the next scheduled stop (and the last before the terminal), Maisons-Alfort.
Soon after the train passed Maisons-Alfort, it reached a four degree grade that led to Gare de Lyon. When Saulin passed a yellow signal instructing him to slow the train in preparation for being switched to an empty platform, Saulin discovered his brakes barely worked. As the train picked up speed from its descent, Saulin desperately radioed an emergency warning, but failed to identify himself to the controller. He pressed the general alarm button on his radio and left his cab to evacuate the passengers to the rear of the train.
Train 153944 crashed into a delayed outbound train as its passengers were evacuating, heeding warnings made by the delayed train’s driver André Tanguy, who remained in his cab repeating his warning until he was killed in the collision.
Read more about this topic: Gare De Lyon Rail Accident