6:16
Hello, I'm Sarah Campbell. One person has died and several others have been injured after two trains collided near Bedford. It happened during rush hour with footage from the scene showing bloodied passengers being evacuated onto the railway. These are the latest pictures we are getting from passengers who were on the train. A major incident has been declared with firefighters, police, and ambulance crews still at the scene. The services that collided were the 1640 from Corby to London St. Pancress and the 1550 from Nottingham to London St. Pancress. Prime Minister Karma says his thoughts are with the family of the person who's died and that he's grateful to the emergency services for their swift response.
Here is the full statement from British Transport Police. Officers are continuing to respond to a collision between two trains on the line in Bedford following reports around 5:15 p.m. today. It then goes on to say, "We know that a number of people have been injured and one person has very sadly died." Finally, it adds a major incident has been declared and officers are continuing to respond at the scene alongside colleagues from Bedfordshire Police and the local fire and rescue and ambulance services. Well, let's go back now to our reporter, Alex Pope, who is at the scene and has been for several hours now. Alex, and just take us through the operation as you've seen it.
Yes. So basically this area has been an absolute hive of activity this afternoon with um basically the walking wounded coming off the train from just up there. So it's basically a massive railway line that runs pretty much from from Nottingham into London. So there were people joining the train from you know places like Ketering, Wellingborough. And what I was seeing was people coming off that train with suitcases dressed up for the evening out going into London shocked but relieved that they were okay. So they were actually be then being sent here in this area just outside of Kentston Hardwick to go in to go on onwards to where they needed to go. We had people confused.
They didn't know where they were. We obviously having tourists. Um, I heard people with different accents, but I also heard people praising the emergency services for helping because we've we've seen police vehicles, we've seen ambulances, we've seen helicopters flying overhead, we've had network rail here, we've had buses fing people um out of the area. So, it's it's quietened. It is a lot quieter now, but obviously people relieved as they came off in shock, but obviously saddened because people had been injured and obviously as we now know, one fatality. Indeed. And you've been telling us about the extent of the emergency response, but also of the help from the local community coming to support these people who many of whom
were stranded and wondering what on earth they were going to do now. Yes. I mean, we're we're not quite in the middle of nowhere, but we are we aren't in an area that there are shops or places nearby. There is a business, but it is shut just opposite there. And they're in a in an area that they don't know. I mean, people, you know, people will not know this area. So, they were being dropped off and you could hear them trying to get a taxi or call their family members to come and get them. and actually saw looked like one mother just hugging her daughter who sadly was quite seriously injured but was able to walk and being taken home and obviously relieved that she was able to pick her family member up.
Alex Pope uh at the scene. Thank you so much for bringing us the very latest. In the last hour, the Prime Minister Karma says that his thoughts are with the family of the person who's died in the two train collision. he wrote on social media describing the hugely concerning reports of a collision involving two passenger trains near Bedford. First and foremost, my thoughts are with the family of the person who has sadly lost their life and with those who've been seriously injured. Finally, the prime minister says I am grateful to the emergency services for their swift response to this tragic incident. And let's uh take you to these pictures that have come into the BBC showing the inside of the train uh showing some
injured uh passengers and uh just that's in the immediate uh aftermath. Now Brett Bay is an eyewitness. He was on board the train and he spoke to me about his response to the crash and what he saw. Physically I'm absolutely fine but obviously like mentally I'm a bit shaken. If you can, can you tell me what happened, what you saw? Yeah. So, um it was the 10 5 train to St. Pancress. Um, I was coming from Bedford and um, I got on the carriage and uh, I stood like men typically do by the uh, the doors and I was by the first glass panel and I was just lent up
against that and we probably left Bedford for what may have felt for 5 minutes and there was a I knew something was up because the train never slows down from Bedford to Luton and I felt it break and it was gradual and as soon as I reacted like huh then it was like a boom smash and everyone that was sat down went flying into one another. Um I was bumped like I thank God like I'm completely uninjured. Um, my phone went flying and then I looked and it was just like shrieks and groans of pain and uh, shock. Um, and I also thank that I am first aid trained uh, cuz I'm a teacher. Um, so I just like sprung into that mode of looking around at everyone and assessing like the injuries and there was a woman in front of me that had like
um completely like snapped her leg and uh there was a woman behind her. They were sort of on top of each other. Um she couldn't move because of her back. There was a guy further down the carriage that couldn't move his neck. He was laid on the floor and people were holding him still. There was seriously deep gashes. Um that like luckily I keep saying to my friends, luckily I was wearing a uh a vest cuz I had to take my top off and um compress uh an old lady's wound on her head. Um and I was like going around and getting people's like spare shirts to sort of bandage it and just make sure everyone was conscious and okay and just
assessing the situation. And I opened the uh I opened the doors with the emergency handle. Um I was letting people on and off and yeah and then the emergency services turned up in their droves. I've never seen so many emergency services. There were hundreds of ambulance workers of police of firefighters. There was four air ambulances and they made us um drop down the uninjured once uh the ambulances were the first aiders were here. We all dropped down went across the field and that's when they started to like triage the uh the uninjured and the ones that could walk um but are injured sort of on the left and the right and then um slowly they started to like process everyone. Um, but yeah, it looked like
it was a four carriage that I was in, the fast train, and it looked the only theory I have is that there was a signal fault or something because it the train must have been stopped and we crashed into them. Um, I can't think of another explanation, but yeah, that it's hard to condense everything that happened into, you know, a short statement, but it was uh it was horrific. Um, but it was me in a full carriage. It was me and two other people that were uninjured just going around like triaging people and treating them and consoling them cuz people were obviously rightly so freaking out passing out. That was Brett Bay who was on the train.
Um, I want to bring you some breaking news. We've had a statement from the East of England Ambulance Service uh with an update on the number of injuries. As far as they are aware, um they've said that the collision between the two passenger trains near Bedford has left 11 people with very serious injuries, 22 seriously injured, and 56 with minor injuries. That according to the East of England Ambulance Service and of course we already know that one person has very sadly died. But just to repeat those numbers, 11 people with very serious injuries, 22 seriously injured, and 56 with minor injuries. That does really give you a sense of the huge numbers of people involved uh in this incident. Now, the transport
secretary Heidi Alexander has posted on social media about this uh writing on X. She said that she was deeply saddened to hear that one person has died and a number of people injured in the awful collision near Bedford. She said, "Our thoughts are with their loved ones and everyone affected and that emergency services remain on the scene." Well, let's speak to our correspondent Nomia Igbal who is at London St. Pancress station for us. And Nomia, both of those trains were due to arrive at St. Pancress. Hi Sarah. Yes. So this was uh the destination for the train coming into St. Pancress. It's just I think it's Yes. Just gone 10 here in the evening. This is incredibly busy. It's a Friday night. It usually is. Uh but
Alex mentioned earlier my our colleague uh from Bedford that there were tourists on there. And so this is a major international hub. uh transport hub, but it's also obviously a uh major hub for domestic travel. And uh the trains involved, just to recap, were the uh the 440 from Corby to London St. Pancress and then also the 350 from Nottingham to London St. Pancress. And just to give you a sense of you know the how busy it gets here for EMR, I think more than 100 trains operate out of for EMR from St. pancreas every day up to like five trains per hour. And so all of that has now been cancelled. So anywhere you go inside that you learn that uh the departure boards all the entries are
read uh for that for the for EMR which tell the story of exactly what's happened. I went inside and I, you know, spoke to people who were there and to find out if they had planned to travel or if they know anyone that was on the train or those both trains, but uh they uh I think people have left because the crash, as we know, happened a lot earlier. Officials don't really know what's going on in terms of exactly what caused the collision. So, there's not a lot of information there. But the only concrete information of course that we do have is anyone that is planning to travel. It's not going to happen. So passengers are being basically delayed and diverted well into the evening. We're not quite sure what it will be like in the
morning, but for tonight very much those trains are cancelled. Okay, Nomia Igbal at St. Pancra Station, a very busy St Pancre station. Uh we will leave it there. Thank you. Well, the two main hospitals uh in the area have posted on social media uh to say that their medics are helping passengers injured in the train crash. So, Bedford Hospital and the Luton and Dunable University Hospital have asked the public to avoid attending their emergency departments uh unless they have a genuine emergency. just a an idea there as to the pressure that's being put on the local health services as a result of this uh incident. And
I'll just remind you to give you a sense of the extent of uh the injuries that we know that the East of England Ambulance Service released in the last few moments. They said that obviously one person has been killed, but 11 people left with very serious injuries, 22 seriously injured, and 56 with minor injuries. Now, Richard Fuller is the Conservative MP for North Bedfordshire, and he's been uh talking me through what he's been hearing and seeing at Bedford Station. I'm here at Bedford Station, which is a couple of hours ago was full of people not knowing what the situation was, wanted to get into London, wanted to go further north, and as you would be able to see if I pan around right now, uh
it's very quiet. So the first thing has been the excellent response of the temps link staff here at Bea Station to make sure that people knew what the situation was and got people to where they could get to so we could then continue their journey whether it's going north or south and mainly that's been kept get to people uh to Milton Kees and to go on the train from Milton Kees. There's also been issues here about, as your previous reporter was saying, about buses going to collect people uh at the site both on the two um East Midlands trains affected, but also on the Tempame's link train that was uh stopped
and caught and where there were concerns about overheating for the passengers. And I understand that people will be now be taken from there to other destinations, then moved on to their uh place uh that they were trying to get to. Uh but also you know this is you know it's such a important incident this on a day where you know people will be trying to get into London trying to go on their holidays perhaps on the weekend um heavily trafficked uh train line one of the most uh heavily committed train lines as well and this is a very significant uh incident. Our thoughts must go out to first of all to the driver of the train that collided at speed and also uh to everyone on that train and their loved ones.
Well, indeed, uh, we were speaking to our reporter, Alex Pope, who'd managed to speak to some of the walking wounded, the people that were able to get off the train. Of course, that the concern is, uh, the number of people that perhaps we haven't been able to speak to because they may have been more seriously injured. We've heard from the health secretary, James Murray, saying a number of people have been injured. This is clearly a very serious incident. It is a serious incident. It's also as earlier on people it's quite a rare incident but railway lines in the UK are very safe railway lines but this is a serious incident and uh our local hospitals both here in Bedford also in
Luton uh will be now looking after a large number of people who are on those trains and that's why it's important uh if you live in the Bedford area uh and you think you might need to go to A&E do go if you need to but just think twice about fact that the staff there today will be working very hard indeed to look after people who have been hurt and injured in this incident. I think perhaps a word for what you've seen of the emergency response um to the incident uh you know clearly doing their very best to get a large number of people to safety.
Yeah, we have an outstanding uh police uh fire service and uh great air ambulance and ambulance service. That was Richard Fuller, the MP for North Bedfordshire. Uh we will bring you any uh latest news uh following the collision of two trains in Bedfordshire which we know now has injured 89 people and killed one person.
