Fires on French railway tracks have delayed journeys for 800,000 travelers in what the transport minister described as “coordinated attacks of malicious intent.”

A co-ordinated arson attack on the French rail system is turning the first weekend of the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris into a nightmare for hundreds of thousands of travelers.

French rail company SNCF announced on Friday its high-speed train system had been hit by “deliberate arson attacks to damage [its] facilities” causing delays and cancellations which are expected to last all weekend.

The disruptions are affecting trains heading East, North and West of Paris, and travelers have been asked to postpone their plans.

  • Flying Squid@lemmy.worldM
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    17
    arrow-down
    3
    ·
    4 months ago

    I know this is terrible of me, but… I was originally not planning on watching the opening ceremonies. Now I’m going to scare-watch them.

    • grue@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      6
      arrow-down
      1
      ·
      4 months ago

      The timing snuck up on me and I haven’t figured out how to get viewing access to them (whether broadcast, subscription, or 🏴‍☠️). Any suggestions?

      • Flying Squid@lemmy.worldM
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        11
        arrow-down
        1
        ·
        edit-2
        4 months ago

        For the last Olympics, I connected my VPN to Canada because it was on the CBC for free. Hooray for public-funded media! And if I could send some money to the CBC’s way and not have to do that, I would. Same with the UK TV license.

        That said, none of my UK VPN addresses are working for UK TV anymore. I’m hoping the Canadian ones still work.

        Edit: Seems to be working but it’s not live streaming for another 1:45. Here’s the link for the CBC. https://www.cbc.ca/player/play/video/9.6443205

        I use Private Internet Access as my VPN if that helps.

          • Flying Squid@lemmy.worldM
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            12
            arrow-down
            1
            ·
            4 months ago

            Conservatives talk about defunding the BBC in the UK too. I wish they’d just allow people from other countries to give them money instead.

        • mecfs@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          2
          ·
          4 months ago

          RTS and SRF also free with swiss VPN

          Or TF1 with french VPN

          Or ORF with austrian vpn

          • Flying Squid@lemmy.worldM
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            4
            arrow-down
            1
            ·
            4 months ago

            Thanks! For my case, I’m assuming none of them are in English and I’m a dumb 'murcan who barely made it through French in high school, so I’m going to have to stick with Canada. But hopefully that will help others.

            • grue@lemmy.world
              link
              fedilink
              English
              arrow-up
              3
              ·
              4 months ago

              As a 'murcan who took Latin in high school (because SAT scores were a higher-priority goal than actually becoming bilingual, LOL) and is now learning French of my own volition, I think maybe the Olympics would be a relatively good candidate for watching in French. At least with the simpler/less-subjective sports (e.g. track and field, as opposed to e.g. gymnastics), it could be possible to follow along just with the infographics on the screen even if you struggle to understand the commentary.

              (Also, thanks for the advice. I’ve got a PIA subscription that I really don’t use enough, so this is a good push to finally figure out how to set it up properly.)

            • mecfs@lemmy.world
              link
              fedilink
              English
              arrow-up
              2
              ·
              4 months ago

              I like to watch national TV from other countries its fun way to get to know the language and culture

              • Flying Squid@lemmy.worldM
                link
                fedilink
                English
                arrow-up
                1
                arrow-down
                1
                ·
                4 months ago

                I used to do that when I was younger, but these days it’s usually for something like the Olympics where I want to understand what’s going on.

                I do get a huge dose of Canadian pride though, so that’s fun.

    • mryessir@lemmy.sdf.org
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      1
      ·
      4 months ago

      Showing colour is nothing to be accused of. It should imply the start of a discussion.

      What do you expect on the opening ceremonies?

  • VirtualOdour@sh.itjust.works
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    6
    arrow-down
    36
    ·
    4 months ago

    No suggestion who or why, could be so many groups in France or from outside.

    Does highlight one of the big problems with trains, one problem with the rails and the whole train network is fucked

    • puppy@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      20
      arrow-down
      1
      ·
      4 months ago

      Same goes for roads as well. Weren’t there major congestion when that ship hit the US bridge?

      • Quacksalber@sh.itjust.works
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        8
        arrow-down
        6
        ·
        4 months ago

        He has a point though. Burn down one relay station and a whole region of switches and signals seizes to function. Collapsing a bridge is no equivalent to that.

        • puppy@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          10
          arrow-down
          2
          ·
          edit-2
          4 months ago

          That would’ve been the case in early times. Now everything is computer controlled. So redundancy should be built into the system. For example Japanese bullet trains run in one of the highest earthquake prone regions in the whole world. And they get hit by earthquake frequently. Yet the bullet train delays are messured in seconds! Not minutes, not hours, literally seconds. Not to mention that after more than 50 years of service that haven’t been a single passenger fatality. Zero.

          • Quacksalber@sh.itjust.works
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            1
            arrow-down
            6
            ·
            edit-2
            4 months ago

            Redundancy or not, the cables that send those computer signals run alongside the tracks. Cut those and everything stops.

          • SpacetimeMachine@lemmy.world
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            1
            arrow-down
            6
            ·
            4 months ago

            Yea but that’s Japan. The culture there really is completely different. I wouldn’t count on other metro services to be as well planned and run as theirs is.

        • Ghoelian@lemmy.dbzer0.com
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          5
          arrow-down
          1
          ·
          4 months ago

          I guess the equivalent would be burning down a traffic control building or something, taking out the traffic lights (assuming those are centrally controlled, i have no clue tbh)

          But even that would be mostly solved by sending out all the lollipop people.

      • VirtualOdour@sh.itjust.works
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        4
        arrow-down
        5
        ·
        4 months ago

        It’s very different for roads, yeah there are of course bottle necks especially due to river crossings but rerouting is much easier.

        Look I get people don’t want to see trains as anything other than perfect but if we want trains to be popular and useful we need to live in reality rather than some delusional fantasy,

        • I_Miss_Daniel@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          3
          ·
          4 months ago

          Wallace and Grommit seem to show otherwise, with the ability to lay new track ahead of the train in real time.