"Ladies and Gentlemen, Some of you may be able to smell a burning smell.
(Look of panic from commuters) This is quite normal, and is caused by a
stuck brake."
or this one, after the train had just ground to a halt in a tunnel with an
obvious power failure:
"Ladies and Gentlemen, as you may have noticed, we have lost power. I would
tell you what's going on, except that the radio doesn't work without
power!" (The P.A. system obviously must be on a battery)
On one occasion, after commuters had been shuffled from train to train
after a failure, we got the driver saying "Control has just advised me that
they want you to change trains _again_. Bear with me while I contact them
and see if we can't talk some sense into them." We then got to hear him
arguing with the control centre, who finally gave in and let us continue on
that train!
The Brits can have a wicked sense of humour during a stuff-up.
Regards,
Mike Alexander
(malex@bigfoot.com)