Thirty-two days after he walked away from the Paddington Rail disaster which almost cost him his life, David Taylor boards the 10.18 from Didcot.

David is travelling to London. Once again, this will involve his train passing through Ladbroke Grove, where 31 people lost their lives and many others were injured.

David Taylor, 34, is the Oxfordshire survivor who has, unsought, become a spokesman for the victims of Ladbroke Grove.

He is a calm, confident person who walked away from hell, back to the arms of his wife Dianne and the future with their ten-week old son, Gage. It is only in the quietest moments that his continuing reaction to the horrific events becomes evident. On board the 10.18, he speaks in measured tones, yet there is a rage inside him that counselling has not quelled and never will.

"I was sorting my ticket out when it happened," he explains. "We were just so close to the station and in some ways, that's the hardest thing to accept - we were almost there, at Paddington. How could it have happened?"

Apart from bruising on his knee and a cut nose, he was uninjured. On Saturday, he joined a demonstration organised by Safety on Trains Action Group, made up of those who lost loved ones in the Southall disaster and at Ladbroke Grove and who are demanding that this will never happen again because a company put profit before safety measures. As we hurtle towards Ladbroke Grove, David says he will know when we are at the spot of the impact. "I'll think, that's where I saw the guy collapsing and that's where I saw the woman who was badly burned."

He now takes precautions when he travels by train - a protective smoke hood and a spring-loaded punch which could be used to break crashed train windows,

At the demo's destination - Trafalgar Square - David Taylor says he is happy with the turnout. "It's great. It shows ordinary people have a voice."

David speaks first, and he does so with a simple eloquence. "I'm just someone like you," he tells the crowd. "I was just going to work on the fifth of October. Two miles outside Paddington, there was a huge fireball and I wondered if I would ever see my family again. Now, I live with the guilt that I might have been able to do more.

"Pick 31 people - that's what Railtrack did. That's 31 people who won't be around tomorrow."

At 2.30pm, David Taylor makes his way back to Paddington to catch his train home - with his precautionary smoke hood in his pocket and an angry disgust in his heart.

Story date: Monday 08 November

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.