In what is officially being called sabotage, the railway network long-distance traffic in northern Germany was paralyzed for three hours on Saturday morning, Oct. 8. The national rail agency Deutsche Bahn said it was not a technical defect but was caused by the theft or destruction of cable connections of the radio system, in two separate locations.
Long-distance travel to or from Hamburg, Schleswig-Holstein and Lower Saxony and in the direction of Kassel-Wilhelmshöhe, Berlin and North Rhine-Westphalia was effected. The ICE high speed trains, which are dependent on these cables, were unable to function. Most service has now been restored.
According Deutche Bahn the wired connections of the digital train radio GSM-R (Global System for Mobile Communications - Rail), the railway were cut which are “used for communication between the control centers that control the train traffic and the trains, and is therefore an indispensable part of smooth train traffic.”
