Passengers experienced long delays and trains were brought to a standstill for over an hour at Bray station on Sunday afternoon due to a “small group” of people forcing open doors and walking on to the track, Irish Rail has said.
The 15th annual Bray Air Display event returned to the Co Wicklow town this weekend after a forced two-year break due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
Many attendees travelled to the show by train and due to a delay while waiting for a platform to clear, some travellers disembarked the carriages on to the trainline.
Stewards assisted some passengers who had remained in the carriage to exit the train, according to footage seen by The Irish Times.
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Barry Kenny, spokesman for Irish Rail, said there was a southbound Dart waiting just outside Bray station for a short period of time for a platform to become available.
“Unfortunately, the train was waiting for 5½ minutes when a small group forced open the doors and went on to the track. This meant that trains couldn’t move in either direction, obviously, because they were on the track,” he said. “That then caused other people to do the same. And it also happened to the Dart behind as a result, because there were people on the track. It’s obviously a dangerous place to be.”
Mr Kenny said what was initially a 5½ minute delay outside the station “has become an hour in which we can’t move trains in and out of Bray on one of the busiest days of the year”.
“The gardaí and our own staff are working to clear the line, it should be clear now for that first group.”
Mr Kenny added: “We will be working to ensure we get people away from the Bray air show afterwards without incident. We apologise to the people that were affected by it. Certainly it caused significant additional delays for people through no fault of their own.”
Train services resumed between Dalkey and the station at about 5pm on Sunday.
Mr Kenny said the transport provider had additional Darts running to cater for the demand as it is a “hugely busy day”.
A spokesman for An Garda Síochána said its members and emergency services attended the scene of an incident at the rail line near Bray train station, which resulted in “disruption to rail services in the area”. Gardaí assisted with traffic management, the spokesman added.
Meanwhile, Dublin City Council’s traffic and incident management centre said there were “very heavy volumes” of traffic on the M50 southbound towards the M11 for the Bray Airshow.
In a statement, the organisers of the Bray Air Display said they had worked closely with gardaí, Wicklow County Council and public transport providers for the past three months to ensure additional public transport capacity to and from the town for the event.
“This includes additional Dart capacity and services to and from Howth, Malahide, Connolly, Dún Laoghaire and Greystones for the event. We always advise coming to the air display early if at all possible as it is a hugely popular event,” the statement said.
