Smoke break leads to passenger clinging to high-speed train in Austria

A man has survived clinging to the outside of an Austrian high-speed train, Austria’s state railway said on Sunday, reportedly after it left while he was having a cigarette break.

The man late on Saturday grabbed onto the outside of the train at St Poelten, west of Vienna, railways spokesman Herbert Hofer said, and was later taken on board after the train performed an emergency stop.

“It is irresponsible, this kind of thing usually ends up with someone dying,” he said.

“And you’re not just putting yourself in danger, if you end up under the train there’s rescuers, there’s police, fire service that come,” he added.

The railjet train was on its way from Zurich in Switzerland to the Austrian capital and left Sankt Poelten on time but arrived in Vienna with a seven-minute delay, Hofer said.

Citing a passenger on board, Austrian tabloid Heute said the man jumped into the space between two carriages after the train began to set off from a planned stop in Sankt Poelten.

The man had taken advantage of being at a station to smoke a cigarette on the platform, Heute said.