- Passengers were stranded for five hours in an undersea tunnel when a Eurotunnel train broke down.
- One passenger described being stranded in the 32-mile tunnel as "terrifying."
- Passengers had to walk through a service tunnel to be evacuated, per the Press Association.
A passenger who was among dozens stranded for five hours in an undersea rail tunnel described walking to a rescue train as "terrifying" and likened it to a scene from a disaster movie.
The news was reported by multiple outlets, including The Press Association and The Guardian.
On Tuesday, the 3:50 p.m. Eurotunnel Le Shuttle service from Calais to Folkestone was approximately 10 minutes into the crossing when the train stopped and the lights went out, a passenger told The Press Association.
Around 23 miles of the 32 mile-long Channel Tunnel, which runs between Kent in the UK and Calais in France, is underwater, making it the world's longest undersea tunnel, according to Eurostar. The journey should usually take around 35 minutes, according to Eurotunnel's website.
Passengers were initially told there was an issue with the wheels and waited an hour and a half while the problem was investigated, per The Guardian. Eventually, passengers were forced to abandon their cars and transferred to a different train for evacuation to Folkestone. This required passengers to walk for around 10 minutes through a separate service tunnel, per The Guardian.
Videos posted on social media and shared with Sky News show a dozen or so passengers, some laden with bags, walking through a dimly lit concrete tunnel. Sarah Fellow, 37, told the Press Association that the service tunnel was "terrifying" and the experience was like a disaster movie, The BBC reported.
"You were just walking into the abyss not knowing what was happening. We all had to stay under the sea in this big queue," Fellow said. "There was a woman crying in the tunnel, another woman having a panic attack who was traveling alone."
Passengers were forced to wait longer, after the service train they boarded struggled to gain traction on the tracks, per The Guardian. An unnamed passenger told the BBC that they were stranded for approximately five hours.
A post on Eurotunnel's official Twitter account on Tuesday confirmed that a train had broken down in the tunnel and the company was in the process of transferring customers to a separate passenger shuttle via the service tunnel.
Le Shuttle told the BBC that all passengers were transferred by 8:22 p.m. local time.
On Tuesday, Le Shuttle advised passengers not to arrive at the terminal until after 6 a.m. Wednesday. A spokesperson for Getlink, which runs the Le Shuttle service, told Insider in a statement that the incident was caused by an alarm on board.
"As a result, the Shuttle, which was carrying 100 cars, was brought to a stop and inspected. As a precautionary measure, for their safety and comfort, we transferred the passengers on board to another shuttle, via the service tunnel (which is there for exactly that purpose)," the spokesperson said, adding that all services were back to normal.