Fire on Orange Line train, 225 riders evacuated

BOSTON -- Passengers had to be evacuated due to a fire on the Orange Line in Boston's Chinatown section on Monday.

Cell phone video captured the tense scene inside an Orange Line train as passengers were evacuated after a fire broke out.

“Choking smoke. It was hard to breathe. The car was kind of filled a little bit,” said a passenger. “A little scared - didn’t know what was going to happen.”

According to the fire dept a six-car train was approaching Chinatown when the fire sparked underneath the train.

“We had a smoke condition coming from the second car in and it appeared to be grease buildup underneath the brake system that created a pretty good smoke condition downstairs. We needed to evacuate over 220 people throughout the tunnel,” said Dep. Chief Joseph Finn of the Boston Fire Department. It

Passengers say at first they didn’t know what to do.

"Some people panicked. There was a young lady that was sort of, ‘Does this happen every day? I'm from Sweden.' And I'm like, ‘Just relax. Take it easy. Let the crew do what they have to do.' And everything kind of worked out," said Manny Perez, passenger.

“We just had to walk down the train and then get out and walk right by the trail and then we got to climb up the stairs,” said Liv Berntsson, passenger.

Orange Line service was suspended between North Station and Back Bay for more than an hour as the evacuation and cleanup took place.

No injuries have been reported.

(Copyright (c) 2011 Sunbeam Television Corp. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.)