This was attempted on the TGV during the terrorist wave of the mid-90s in France but, fortunately, it did not detonate.
That being said, I think that they have X-ray checks now on TGVs.
I think what many people seem to be missing is that you don't need to kill 3000 people. If you kill 1000, spread out across 10 cities, you're going to cause a lot of fear and chaos.
Nope.
And I really don’t want to live in a country where boarding a train is as painful as boarding a plane. Millions of people are using train to commute, adding security checks would totally kill the train.
Should the first car of a TGV explode at 350+ km/h I think it would work as a terror attack.
Yet, although train security is nil, it never happens [0]. I'm not sure why. My first guess is there are not that many terrorists. We probably could ease the security on planes with few ill effects.
[0] There has been train attacks or hijacks but no bombs AFAIK.
I didn't get checked for metal objects etc, but there is no point. You can't get to the cab from the train anyway. And the impact of knifings/shootings is the same as in a busy shopping centre. We don't do metal detections there on every visitor.
So the main terrorism risk really relevant to it being a mode of transport rather than any other crowded place, is bombing and thus derailment of the entire train. And that is something that is checked for, at least here in Spain.
It is true that it is "checked" in Spain; I experienced it this summer while going from Sevilla to Cordoba. However the check is (in my experience) quite superficial; also, as it creates long lines of people that get upset that they may miss their train, it is expedited and many things do not in fact pass through the X-ray machine. And finally, it is not checked on all trains; we were checked from Sevilla to Cordoba (the train was going all the way up to Barcelona) but there were no checks on the return leg.
So, while it would be trivial to bring bad things aboard a train in France, it seems that it wouldn't be difficult in Spain either.
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2015_Thalys_train_attack
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_15:17_to_Paris
Spain in 2004:
Pre 2001, there was more than 10 hijack almost every year.
Trains are left to themselves, there is no surveillance.
Ill intentioned people can change dynamic of the attack, instead of needing 2 planes and use them as kinetic projectiles against buildings, they'd need an armed guy on 10 trains
The end result in terms of human losses is the same because a guy with a gun can go through each and every compartment and off everybody before the police would even know what's going on.
Multiply that scenario by 10 or 20 or 30 and you have the worst national tragedy in the history of the nation.
I am thankful because if people on HN can't conceptualize that, then the odds of some goatfuc*er in the mountains of Afghanistan doing it are even lower....but still people thought they could not conceptualize the attacks happened in the 2000s. Everybody remembers the first, but there were also London and Madrid.
Also, your hypothesis is that a single person could kill everybody on a train, but in reality they'd get assaulted with suitcases, the doors between carriages would be barricaded, somebody would pull the emergency brake and people would flee, etc. This was actually tried once in France, and the attacker managed to kill zero (0) people before they were overpowered.
https://www.france24.com/en/france/20201217-thalys-train-gun...
There would be zero risk for the terrorist. There are no baggage check, and no one makes sure the owners of each luggage are on board. In theory each suitcase should have a label with the owner's name and address, but that too is not checked (and even if it was it would be the easiest thing to fake).
I just don't understand why it doesn't happen. I think the main reason is because there are very few actual terrorists, contrary to what everyone wants us to believe.
The amount of people per square foot surface, the fact that there is no way out and the fact that police cannot rush to the scene
Planes are much more sensible to all of those potential threat. That is why we ended up with such drastic security. Although I have to say, in a lot of places, security is way more relaxed. If you travel from the E.U to the E.U you have way less check and queue time.