Ah but it pretty much was. A train was due to leave Brighton for Falmer at about 1:25. They filled it up, it moved off about ten feet, then ground to a halt. At which point a guard came striding up the train shouting at everybody to get off because the train was on fire. So a few hundred people shuffled back off the train, and were then told to move back away to another platform because of the "fire".
I saw no smoke or flames, so assumed it was probably some sort of warning light in the cab rather than an actual fire. Either way, that train remained stuck on platform 7 (?) for ages, blocking it off for incoming shuttle services to Falmer and beyond, so they all had to be sent in via platform 8. This was the reason for the backlog at Brighton, and I think the prime reason for the delay in getting people to the Amex.
So, in the sense that it was down to another crappy broken down train, I'm going to say Southern have some responsibility here
This sounds right. I saw the train on an odd part of platform 7 and a train board at Falmer said a train from Brighton was cancelled.
Blame Derby who built the trains.
