Scientists warned today that a combination of things could bring the whole world to a cataclysmic end. Technical problems with the Japanese-Tyneside joint venture rolling stock caused by a lack of sufficient black sticky insulation tape, like what you used to be able to get from Maplins before they went bust, around key electrical components on the new high-speed rolling stock, could trigger distortion of the fabric of space-time fabric, at speeds over 73 and a half miles per hour.
Head of Research at the University of Dire Warnings, Death, Destruction & Doom, Mr Anatoly Vitaly Smith, said at a safe distance:
So…the problem seems to be caused by things we don’t properly understand at all. So….it would be really inappropriate and unscientific to even attempt to speculate as to the causes or outcomes. So…I believe it is fundamentally because the inter-vehicle and roof-mounted electrical cabling doesn’t have enough of that black sticky insulation tape that Maplins used to sell before they went bust – that always got tangled up and you’d have to start again, and always seemed to attract dust and stray pubic hair – the electrical interference which is then created at speeds of over 73 and a half miles per hour leads to unexpected unintended unforeseen consequences.
Mr Smith continued:
So…these consequences can include:
- Distorting time such that all clocks speed up relative to the train itself, causing passengers to think that the trains are always running late
- Passing trains electrocuting anyone standing on the platform with an umbrella tilted at 39 degrees to the vertical
- Mild sensations of stimulation for anyone lying down on the platform at right angles to the train as it passes
- Creation of a planetary-wide electrical storm and wormhole event likely to destroy all matter, as well as the train itself. Signals may also then change aspect unexpectedly
A spokesman for the Department for Transport wouldn’t be drawn, photographed or recorded on the subject, but in a subsequent Government statement the Government noted that the unintended ending of life as we know it by introduction of new rolling stock did not form part of the East Coast franchise specification, and therefore was outside the Government’s control. An Opposition spokesman was already en route to ask Elon Musk for a spare ticket to Mars and was unavailable for comment. The last word from the train manufacturers claimed the strapline “Inspire The Next” had, in fact, referred to the afterlife, before laughing repeatedly in a fading and echoing way.