‘Malicious and targeted’ cable sabotage halts Deutsche Bahn trains across northern Germany

In the early hours of 08 October 2022, Deutsche Bahn halted all long-distance rail traffic across northern Germany after communication cables vital to train operations were cut at two separate locations. The damage knocked out the GSM-R digital train radio system, which carries communication between traffic control centres and trains, leaving the network unable to operate safely. Services in Lower Saxony, Bremen, Hamburg and Schleswig-Holstein stopped, the Berlin to Amsterdam route was suspended, and thousands of travellers were stranded for about three hours before traffic resumed.

Investigators located two crime scenes: one at the Karower Kreuz junction in Berlin-Karow and another in Herne, North Rhine-Westphalia. According to security sources cited in news reports, two cables important to the GSM-R radio system were severed at the two sites, causing the entire system to fail. One of the cut lines reportedly served as a redundant backup for the other, a detail that suggested the act required knowledge of how the network was built rather than a random strike.

Deutsche Bahn attributed the outage to sabotage of cables that are indispensable for train traffic. Transport Minister Volker Wissing told reporters it was clear the disruption was a targeted and malicious action, while saying the background of the act was initially unknown. Federal police and, from 13 October, the Federal Prosecutor General took over the investigation given the potential significance of the case.

At the time, officials treated the cable cuts as deliberate, coordinated sabotage by actors with knowledge of the railway network, and the incident fed wider concern about attacks on Western critical infrastructure. No perpetrator was ever publicly identified, however, and no claim of responsibility emerged. Early speculation, including suggestions of possible foreign or Russian involvement, was never confirmed, and investigators did not establish a culprit or motive in their public findings. Attribution remains unknown and unproven; the sabotage framing reflects official assessment rather than a settled conclusion.