LYCOS RETRIEVER 
Channel Tunnel: Fire
built 645 days ago
When England and France decided to link their two countries with a 32-mile rail tunnel beneath the English Channel, engineers were faced with a huge challenge. Not only would they have to build one of the longest tunnels in the world; they would have to convince the public that passengers would be safe in a tunnel this size. Tunnel fires, like the Holland Tunnel disaster, were common at this time. How did the engineers resolve this problem? They built an escape route.
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[One] thing to notice when you are in the Channel Tunnel is that yellow fire doors slide across the connection between coaches. In the open, these doors are slid back out of sight and the vestibules between coaches are open. There is a slight rise in the floor over the bogie (the coach ends are supported on a common bogie) and there are glass doors between the vestibule and the seating area. The fire doors do not prevent access to the next coach - they open if you want to walk through, but I didn't leave my seat while we were in the tunnel - there was too much to experience - so I don't know whether they open automatically as you approach.
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The water supply at the two cross-passages became significantly poorer when firefighting operations began, mostly due to leaking pipework in the south running tunnel. The number of jets was reduced to two until a Eurotunnel engineer reconfigured the valves to isolate the pipework between the two cross-passages. Once the section of pipe was isolated, water delivery improved substantially.
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At present, passenger trains using the tunnel have to be capable of being divided in two in the case of a fire. The safety rules ... require operators to use a special locomotive capable of coping with the signals and power supply on both sides of the Channel. Under European Union open access rules for railways, the £5.7 billion High Speed One, due to open in a fortnight between the Channel Tunnel and St Pancras, has been built to accommodate trains from across Europe.
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As the French works brigade made their way east along the service tunnel, they came across the evacuees near CP4131. They checked that the amenity coach was empty, and escorted the driver to safety. At 22:35, they closed the fire door in cross-passage 4131 and concentrated on assisting the worst-affected of the evacuees with oxygen. They were assisted by the works fire brigade from the British side, who arrived on the scene at 22:30.
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A complete commanding post is installed in the emergency tunnel. More than 200 oxygen bottles were in use, refills had to make a 80 Km long run. 6 firefighting engines were loaden aboard a train and brought to the site in the northern tube at 1.47 AM.
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