Children are using camera phones to film themselves playing “chicken” on rail lines, police warned yesterday. Officers highlighted the dangerous fad after two boys of 14 and 15 were killed by a train at Darlington, northern England, in March. One clip found on another teenager’s phone showed him and a friend playing on a main line in Gloucestershire as an express raced towards them at 120 kph (75 mph). In the movie, a friend is heard yelling for the boy to jump seconds before a train thunders past. The file was found by a father and handed to police. The British Transport Police commented: “What they did beggars belief”.

From Metro, March 2005. Contributed by Anna Cronin de Chavez.