‘There was a popping, like champagne’

AT ABOUT 12.30pm around 20 or 30 passengers are evacuated from a Tube train at Oval station saying that they had seen “white smoke”.

There are also reports of a man dumping a rucksack in a carriage, then fleeing as the doors closed.

Police cordoned off the station.

Sofiane Mohellavi, 35, from Walthamstow, said he had smelt smoke in his carriage on the Victoria Line northbound train.

“I was sitting in the carriage reading a book and I smelt something burning, like wiring or tyres, and it just got more intense,” Mr Mohellavi said.

“Suddenly people panicked and started screaming and were walking on each other’s backs trying to get the hell out of there.

“I couldn’t move, I didn’t know what to do, whether to run or not. People ran and left their shoes and belongings when they smelt the burning.”

Another witness said: “As far as I know from what a lady at the top of the escalator was saying, someone came into the carriage, dumped the bag and ran out. Some people tried to stop him but he ran out. I was in the carriage next to the one where the bag was.

“All of a sudden there was a popping, it sounded like champagne popping. I didn’t think anything of it at the time but then I heard a lot of shouting from the next-door carriage. People started saying, ‘Smoke, smoke’. One of the train guys came through and said, ‘Get off the train, we’re evacuating, everyone out’.

“As we were walking past the carriage we could see the bag sitting on the chair. It was a big, black rucksack, like the backpack-type ones you get. When they got upstairs, people were really distressed, one lady was crying.”

One woman said she saw a man holding a rucksack standing next to a woman with a baby. She said the man dropped the bag and ran out of the carriage.

Passengers tried to chase him but as far as she knew, he had not been caught.