back to article SNCF website announces major train disaster

French railway operator SNCF has apologised after its website earlier today announced a major disaster involving a TGV, which left 102 dead and 380 injured. According to French media, the alert just before noon fingered "an explosion of unknown origin today on board TGV 1234, close to Mâcon". SNCF now admits "this never …

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  1. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    But tell us...

    ...how many news organisations relayed the story without checking it first?

  2. TeeCee Gold badge
    Coat

    Train operators.

    Since we've not seen this cockup happen before in the years to date, no doubt there will be two more just like it along in a minute.

    1. Bassey

      Re: Train Operators

      "Since we've not seen this cockup happen before in the years to date, no doubt there will be two more just like it along in a minute"

      Funny you should mention that because Georgian television did something very similar over the weekend (Saturday, I believe) when their main morning news program ran a "simulation" of how they would cover an invasion by Russia - but forgot to mention it was a simulation, sending the country into something of a fit when they announced Russian tanks were just outside Tbilisi.

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Alien

    How long before...

    ...Alex Jones reveals the 'truth' behind this?

    1. I didn't do IT.
      Alien

      The 'Truth'

      I am sure that if you take a passenger list of everone on that train at the time (obviously obtainable from the US FAA, because it had *something* to do with people moving from one place to another, even if no American was involved...), there will be one or more people of significant importance to "The Plan".

      What's the significnce of a couple hundred extra clones that might just prove useful anyway where ever they work or play?

    2. fran 2
      Badgers

      Alex jones

      Never heard of the chap, just spent a while entertained by some very strange posts on infowar!

  4. Kikki D

    haha

    reminds me of the Georgian news station the other day saying that their Prime Minister had been assassinated & the Russians were invading .....

    what next ? Godzilla runs amok in downtown Tokyo!

  5. Geoff Mackenzie

    Conspiracy theory

    The bomb on the train failed to go off.

    1. Captain TickTock
      Troll

      Would that be...

      The bomb planted by security as part of another exercise...?

  6. Graham Marsden
    Paris Hilton

    "trial to test crisis management procedures"

    Well now they've got a media crisis to manage, so I guess it sort of worked...

    Paris because... ;-)

  7. amanfromMars 1 Silver badge
    Grenade

    Alien Talk

    Whenever you realise that IT and Media can control Reality with their Presentation of News which can be easily Produced to Executive Order and Directed just like a Movie, is the Change to Artificially IntelAIgent Virtual Realities an Inevitability.

    It does help matters though if the Script cannot be faulted or exposed as Cynical Spin and a Gross Fabrication invented just to Justify Starting a War to Spread Chaos and Generate Sales in Weapons to take over Foreign Nations and Steal their Assets...... for all that does is Create Global Enemies who cannot be Defeated and who will Crash Command and Control SCADA Systems with SMARTer Invisible Stealth Networks which have Levers that Master the Internet, Information and Intelligence.

  8. The Original Ash
    Coffee/keyboard

    Which TGV did you say?

    That's the combination on my luggage!

  9. Anonymous Coward
    FAIL

    Not surprised - it is the worst WEB site

    The only dead and injured people are the normal people who try and use this useless site - either because they died waiting for it to give them a timetable or injured because the object they threw at the screen bounced back.

    I have always had to resort to the phone (very nice girls) to buy my travel.....

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Web site

      You're thinking of www.voyages-sncf.com, which is indeed one of the worst web sites on the planet. On the other hand it did once let me buy TGV+Eurostar tickets at a price so cheap that the nice girls in the SNCF shop insisted the tarif didn't exist on their computers :)

    2. Laurent Leconte
      Thumb Down

      speaking of which...

      It appears that customer accounts could be freely accessed from the website :

      http://www.lemonde.fr/societe/article/2010/03/17/les-coordonnees-de-millions-de-clients-de-la-sncf-disponibles-sur-le-net_1320321_3224.html

      (just about everything except the credit card number was available "in just a few clicks")

      The strangest part is that a "nice hacker" reported it to the SNCF, instead of selling them on eBay like anyone else would do

  10. GrahamT
    Unhappy

    SNCF website

    I once bought a return ticket on the SNCF website, from Angouleme to Lille, while in England, using a Swiss credit card (don't ask)

    When I put the card in the ticket machine in Angouleme, it thought for a very long time then reset itself and printed out a slip to say go to customer services. At customer services they swiped the card for the tickets, and it crashed their PC. Several crashes, reboots and calls to their BOFH later, and they gave up. I had to buy a full price ticket to be able to travel (luckily I got to the station early) which they then refunded when I got back to Angouleme 3 weeks later.

    If a credit card can crash their systems, I don't give them much chance in a real emergency.

    I now go to the station and buy the ticket over the counter. The humans seem to get a better price than they show on the website too.

  11. Richard Porter

    Worst web site

    "I have always had to resort to the phone (very nice girls) to buy my travel....."

    You could use the DB site which is generally excellent.

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