France’s TGV high-speed trains resume after attack

Traffic on France’s TGV high-speed trains was gradually returning to normal on Saturday after engineers worked overnight to repair sabotaged signal stations and cables that caused travel chaos on Friday, the opening day of the Paris 2024 Olympic Games.

In Friday’s pre-dawn attacks on the high-speed rail network, vandals damaged infrastructure along the lines connecting Paris with cities such as Lille in the north, Bordeaux in the west, and Strasbourg in the east. Another attack on the Paris-Marseille line was foiled, French rail operator SNCF said. There has been no immediate claim of responsibility.

“On the Eastern high-speed line, traffic resumed normally this morning at 6:30 a.m. while on the North, Brittany and South-West high-speed lines, 7 out of 10 trains on average will run with delays of 1 to 2 hours,” SNCF said in a statement on Saturday morning. “At this stage, traffic will remain disrupted on Sunday on the North axis and should improve on the Atlantic axis for weekend returns,” it added.

SNCF reiterated that transport plans for teams competing in the Olympics would be guaranteed after what the rail company called the “massive attack.”

“Our intelligence services and law enforcement are mobilized to find and punish the perpetrators of these criminal acts,” Prime Minister Gabriel Attal posted Friday on X, calling the attacks “prepared and coordinated acts of sabotage.”

Services from Paris to much of France saw mass cancellations and delays. The Eurostar company said it scrapped about a quarter of its trains between London, Paris, Brussels, and Amsterdam. It predicted cancelling about a fifth of trains over the weekend, and all services will face delays.

British Prime Minister Keir Starmer had to take a plane instead of a high-speed train to the Olympics ceremony. Four special trains bringing Olympic athletes to Paris, including some US team members, went ahead, SNCF said.

With one of France’s busiest holiday travel weekends clashing with the start of the Olympics, SNCF said about a quarter of trains will be cancelled on Saturday and Sunday on the lines attacked. Trains that run will face delays.

The company said thousands of staff worked to repair the damage and try to get services running again. It is estimated that about 250,000 passengers were affected on Friday. Junior Transport Minister Patrice Vergriete said 800,000 could face the fallout over the three days.

The coordinated attacks were staged at 4:00 a.m. (0200 GMT). At each site, the perpetrators targeted fibre optic cables that carry safety information for drivers and control rail changes, SNCF chief executive Jean-Pierre Farandou said.

Gerard Due, mayor of Croisilles in northern France, one of the sites hit, said the attackers had specialized equipment to access the cables and then “threw a flammable liquid” on them.

Vergriete said that the saboteurs had been spotted with “vans,” while “incendiary devices were found at the scene.”

Paris prosecutors opened an investigation into attacks on “the fundamental interests of the nation” and criminal conspiracy. A similar sabotage attack was staged in Germany last year and in eastern France in January 2023.

The attacks left passengers stranded in stations across Paris and in many cities in eastern, western, and northern France. Some at Montparnasse station in Paris were left in tears.