Something on the Piccadilly Line is Eating the Trains

Something on the Piccadilly Line is eating the trains. I am aware that this is an extraordinary claim, but I have no other explanation for what is happening. For background, I live on the Piccadilly Line. When it runs well, it's great and gets me everywhere I want to be. However, recently there have been many times when I have wondered what the point of a tube line is if it doesn't have any trains running. According to TFL, this is because the current stock is old. It suffers from wheel flats, and frequently requires repair while we impatiently await its replacement. Its replacement, a shiny new walk-through model similar to that on the Circle Line, has been delayed for reasons that are unclear. According to TFL, partial line closures are required to make way for the new stock, but I think it's clear by now that there's something TFL aren't telling us. And that is that something is eating the trains.

Consider the evidence. A lack of trains has often been blamed on wheel flats, which is where trains skidding on slippery rails wear unevenly. But couldn't these unevenly shaped wheels also be explained by something chomping them?

I wondered whether I was the first person to make this connection, so I did a little digging in the obscure corners of the internet. It was there that I learned of the Beast of Boston Manor.

The first mention of the beast is in 1975, a mere two years after the introduction of the current Piccadilly Line stock. A westbound driver reported seeing something leap from  the platform and under the train. Fearing the worst, he hit the brakes but after inspection there was no sign of the mystery leaper. It was subsequently ruled upon return to the depot that several of the wheels appeared worn flat, as though something had eaten away at them. This was the first reference to wheel flats on the line. The driver could add little light to the shape he saw dash under the train. It was brown and hairy, and exactly the same size and shape as an Alsatian dog.

There were no more sightings until 1988, when a train inexplicably lost power on the eastbound platform. In his incident report, the driver noted that immediately before the power cut, he had been surprised to see a passenger on the platform who looked uncannily like the writer / wizard / mall Santa / Rasputin impersonator Alan Moore. However subsequent detective work has determined that Alan Moore was in Northampton at the time.

As time passed, the age of the rolling stock became a convenient cover story for the beast. With trains being taken out of service all over the Piccadilly Line, is was clear that the beast had developed quite an appetite. Some have even speculated that it has nested in the Heathrow Loop, specifically at the suspiciously closed Terminal 1. The real reason for the delay in introducing the new stock is that during a test run, one of them was eaten there.

TFL have unofficially stated that there is no silver bullet for getting the new stock online, but they have been stockpiling actual silver bullets in stations around the network.

I attempted to contact TFL for comment, and after a couple of days received the following via email:

"Chew chew choo choo. Chomp chomp chomp. Beast will eat every train. Beast will eat everyone. Good service on all other lines."