A WOMAN who died crossing the rail tracks at Barnt Green tried three times to pull herself onto the platform, before she was hit twice by a train travelling at 65mph.

Crystal Rose Conlon, 35, tried to follow her boyfriend across the tracks after they thought they had boarded the wrong train and needed to go in the opposite direction.

She partly pulled herself onto the platform but her flailing leg was hit by the train, which resulted in her being spun around and hit a second time on her head.

Ms Conlon suffered massive cerebral trauma as a result of the incident at around 6.51am on Thursday, February 9, and died immediately.

An inquest at Worcestershire Coroner’s Court on Wednesday, May 24, heard that Ms Conlon, of Meath Place, Dublin, also had alcohol and drugs including cocaine in her system.

She had travelled from Dublin to England with her boyfriend Alan Foley with the aim of visiting his relatives in Malvern, when they boarded a train at Birmingham New Street.

A rail employee had given them directions to Malvern and “noticed both smelt of alcohol”.

The pair realised on the way they had boarded the wrong train and got off at Barnt Green.

Mr Foley told investigators he thought the right train was in the opposite direction, so he decided to run across the rail tracks rather than use the footbridge.

After reaching the other platform he called Ms Conlon to follow him, which she did, but “by which point the train coming the other way was on top of them”.

Coroner Geraint Williams said: “Witnesses said Ms Conlon tried three times to get up on to the platform but because of her height and that of the platform she struggled to do that.

“She managed to get herself up on the platform apart from one of her legs which was hanging over the edge.

“That was struck by the train, spinning her around, and her head was left hanging over the edge. Her head was then hit by the first step of the first door of the train.

“She was killed immediately.”

The train driver was driving from Worcester Shrub Hill to Birmingham New Street and had stopped at Droitwich Spa and Bromsgrove, but was not due to stop again until Birmingham.

The inquest was told he was travelling into Barnt Green at 65mph when he saw the couple crossing the tracks, sounded his horn and applied emergency breaks, “but he was incapable of stopping”.

Foley left the scene and “vanished” – only coming forward to provide police with information at a later date when an appeal with his picture appeared in news reports.

A post mortem found Ms Conlon suffered massive cerebral trauma, while the toxicology revealed that she had 96mg of alcohol per litre in her blood.

The alcohol had “increased the euphoric effect” of cocaine found in her system.

She also had nordiazepam, methadone and breakdown products of heroin in her system.

A jury recorded the verdict as accidental death.