"The moment I knew I was about to die came a couple of years into my 20s, when life was really just starting out. My best friend, Helen, and I were on our way to Blackburn to catch up with an old university friend who had recently moved there for work. Thrilled to see each other, and basking in the prospect of the party weekend ahead, we chatted nonstop as we made our way by train from York."
"About 50 minutes into our journey, I was dimly aware of a bang. Then came another, this time impossible to ignore. A woman screamed as our carriage was thrown up into the air in what felt like slow motion. Suddenly, Helen and I were somehow on our feet in the middle of the aisle, hugging each other. Head down, eyes screwed shut, I waited for the carriage to roll over and burst into flames, as I'd seen in films."
A young woman and her friend traveled by train toward Blackburn with luggage overhead when a runaway digger rolled down a hill and crashed into the side of the train, causing a derailment. The carriage lurched and was thrown into the air; a metal object smashed through a window and a fellow passenger appeared with his face covered in blood. The woman and her friend moved into the aisle as people screamed, then tended to a lone seven-or-eight-year-old girl, comforting her and passing her through a window toward firefighters. Sirens arrived and passengers evacuated by climbing out of windows.
Read at www.theguardian.com
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