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T it dawned on me the end was near occurred in my 20s, when life was really just starting out. My dearest friend, Helen, and I were headed to Blackburn to catch up with an old university friend who had just relocated there for work. Thrilled to see each other, and enjoying the thought of the party weekend ahead, we conversed constantly as we made our way by train from York.

We stashed our bags – packed with necessities such as our favorite wines and my new pair of black clogs – on the overhead rack and got seated in a comfortable double seat. Roughly halfway through our journey, I was vaguely conscious of a bang. Then came another, this time impossible to ignore. A woman screamed as our carriage catapulted upward in what felt like a delayed sequence. Suddenly, Helen and I were standing up in the middle of the aisle, hugging each other. Head down, vision blocked, I waited for the carriage to roll over and burst into flames, similar to cinematic scenes. My thoughts turned to our loved ones getting the news. Subsequently, there was the young girl weeping.

“You’re all right,” I said softly, speaking with a rasp. “It’s all over,” I murmured, mostly for my own benefit.

She was about seven or eight years old, and appeared to be completely on her own. Her weeping jolted me from my stupor; here was my chance to help. I went to where she was standing and gave her a reassuring hug. “Don't turn around,” Helen yelled, the warning came after the fact. I glimpsed a man with blood all over his face. An enormous piece of metal had crashed through the window behind us. Later, we discovered a driverless construction vehicle had descended the slope and collided with the train, making the train leave the tracks.

Our compartment was trapped with its nose pointing upward. Next was the sound of sirens and another traveler instructed me to pass the little girl to him so he could help her out the window, as kids were being rescued to emergency personnel below. Not long afterward, Helen and I were similarly exiting of the train window and descending via a ladder on to the track.

Standing on firm land again – adjacent to a storage building in Pudsey – my body started to shake uncontrollably. I looked for the little girl and watched her mother gather her up, who it turned out had been in the lavatory during the incident. A rescuer graciously recovered my clogs. One of the passengers plonked down on Helen’s case, making it split apart – but, by good fortune our wine remained intact. After a half-hour wait, we made our way in a provided car to Blackburn, with a teenage boy and the female passenger who had caused the luggage to burst. Our university friend greeted us, ashen-faced. She knew there had been a derailment and a staff member had led her away and made her a cup of tea while she anticipated updates.

Bolstered by youthful resilience, we set the accident aside and carried on with our night out, which included a memorable turn by Blackburn drag queen Clitheroe Kate. There were no fatalities in the incident, despite the fact that several people were taken to hospital. Helen and I escaped with bruises and aches and pains from the violent forward motion in the carriage. The train had been slowing to come into Leeds station, which had been the primary reason in avoiding serious injury. The fact that nobody was badly hurt allowed us not to obsess over the “what ifs” but the child was the one who changed my outlook profoundly. Looking after her and calming her down shifted my focus outward and taught me the importance of looking outwards in a crisis. As time passed, I have repeatedly asked myself if she had any memory of the event, and how big a deal it had been for her.

Helen and I have remained friends for more than three decades and Pudsey has become shorthand for our skill in managing whatever comes, provided we have each other. Being with her that day created the sensation that I was shielded against the most terrifying aspects. The derailment further transformed my method of handling different emergencies, providing me with insight – and reinforcing the idea that, however bad things seem, it remains a gift to get older.