Lady Tanni Grey-Thompson says she was forced to crawl off a train last night when rail staff failed to come and help her amid her journey to the Paralympics.
The gold-medal winning Paralympian, 54, said she arrived into London King’s Cross station around 10pm yesterday and there were no workers there.
She had initially been posting on X, formerly Twitter, about her journey on a London North Eastern Railway (LNER) train into the capital from Leeds.
The wheelchair racing champion, who is now a House of Lords Crossbench Peer, was on the 7.45pm service and had praised rail staff who kept checking on whether or not she needed food.
The train got into the station just after 10pm, and she posted: ‘Hey LNER my train has arrived at KGX and there is no one to get me off.’
Lady Tanni Grey-Thompson, pictured in April at the Laureus World Sport Awards Madrid, says she was forced to crawl off a LNER train last night
The gold-medal winning Olympian, pictured in 2004, said staff failed to come and help her last night
And just minutes later: ‘Cleaning crew are on board.’ And then: ‘Cleaning crew are now leaving the train!!!!’
The Baroness continued posting, desperately trying to find out who could help her.
She wrote: ‘LNER who do I need to call to get off this train!!! It got to KGX 10 mins ago!!!!!’
At 10.24pm, about 15 minutes after Lady Tanni arrived into King’s Cross, she said she’d had to crawl off the train.
She posted on X: ‘Well I’ve just crawled off.
‘At 22.17 (train got in at 22.02) I decided to crawl off. Had to move all my stuff onto the platform. Member of cleaning staff offered to help. They’re not insured.’
Lady Tanni said that she had been starting her journey to Paris for the Paralympics when the saga unfolded.
She told the BBC this morning: ‘I’m going to Paris later today, I’ve got a few bags. I chucked them on the platform, I had to get out of my chair, sit on the floor by the door which is not pleasant and then crawl off.’
Lady Tanni posted just after 10pm yesterday asking when LNER staff would be arriving
Minutes later, she asked again
About 15 minutes later, the Baroness said she was forced to crawl off
She shared the entire experience online
She said she had a ‘contract’ to be met at the other end by staff to help her off the train, adding: ‘Legally I am allowed to turn up and ask to get on a train.
‘We were meant to have level boarding in the UK on 1 January 2020 under the Disability and Discrimination Act but government has kicked the can down the road.’
MailOnline has contacted Lady Tanni for further comment.
LNER has this morning apologised, and said it’s probing the incident.
A spokesperson said: ‘We are sorry to understand there has been an issue at London King’s Cross station on Monday evening.
‘We are in the process of investigating this and are in contact with the customer directly.’
LNER’s Managing Director David Horne also replied to Lady Tanni’s post, saying: ‘My sincere apologies for this Tanni.
‘Something has clearly gone wrong here and we’ve let you down. We’ll investigate what went wrong and share the details.’
But the situation was met with fury online.
One person wrote: ‘This is awful, so sorry to hear this. Did the onboard team just run away (I presume there were staff)? Even station staff should have done a walk through as the train terminated.
‘Awful Tanni, so sorry – disgraceful from LNER, not good enough.’
Another said: ‘Geesh – that is disgraceful. What are you going to do about this LNER?
‘What changes are you going to make to ensure that no wheelchair user is left abandoned on one of your trains?’
One other said: ‘LNER This is disgusting! Why didn’t your crew do a walk through to make sure all passengers had safely disembarked?
‘Appalled that Tanni was left in this situation.’
Lady Tanni has long campaigned for disabled travellers and wrote a piece in the Mail On Sunday in recent years.
She shared her own ‘collection of horror stories’.
Lady Tanni wrote: ‘There was the time I had to crawl from my seat and out of the plane at Berlin’s Brandenburg airport because there were no staff or what’s known as an aisle chair – a buggy-like chair that is narrow enough to get around the plane – to help transport me.
‘Or the time my wheelchair got lost in transit for three months, or when I travelled with my daughter and staff told me I wasn’t a responsible adult, so couldn’t look after her.
‘I’ve even had to crawl to the toilet on a plane, when staff have told me they didn’t want to get the aisle chair – which would transport me to the loo – out of storage.’
She was opening up about her own experiences after the ‘bleak image’ of a disabled woman left abandoned in an empty plane cabin surfaced online.
Lady Tanni revealed that was her Victoria Brignell – a well-respected producer at BBC Radio 4 and friend of mine.
She said: ‘Eventually the crew took it upon themselves to move her – something that, strictly speaking, they are not trained to do or insured for.
‘It was a depressing experience for Victoria, but also a familiar one.’
