For the passengers aboard the Boston-Washington Amtrak train on Tuesday afternoon, it was anything but a good time.

Thanks to an unexpected mechanical error, Train 173 proved to be immobile for approximately five hours. The incident left persons stranded in Connecticut into the evening. The Amtrak train, which had departed from Boston at 11:05 am, was meant to arrive in New York at 3:17 pm.

Amtrak spokeswoman Christina Leeds said that the train became disabled near Greenwich. It’s still not certain what the exact technical error was that led to the train’s problems.

Not only was the train stuck in one area for hours, passengers were left without power. With temperatures actually warm for a change, there was no air conditioning available to help hapless travelers cope with the heat. There was also no water, and toilets didn’t work.

Amtrak had tried to get the 252 passengers on a new train, but wouldn’t you know it? The replacement train also suffered a technical problem. Seriously, what are the odds?

Passengers were finally able to get moving again after a rescue engine was sent out. The train was towed to Stanford, Connecticut. where passengers were able to hop on another train.

Jennifer Merin was one of the unhappy passengers aboard the 173. She made it clear that the rescue came not a moment too soon. “Without air conditioning, without water and without toilets’’ available, the hundreds of persons had “grown testy”.

It was about 8:30 pm on Tuesday evening by the time passengers finally made it to New York.

As unpleasant as the experience was, it could have been much, much worse.

Back in frigid January, about 500 passengers had to be rescued from an Amtrak train outside of Chicago, Illinois after the train was halted by snow and ice. The persons were forced to spend the night in freezing temperatures with no heat and both flooded bathrooms and toilets.

It’s very likely that the persons in those circumstances would have happily traded places.

Image via Wikimedia Commons