Cover thy heads, mortals! Repent! Repent! That rumbling sound you hear drawing near is the four horsemen! For the apocalypse is upon us! The signs are all here, starting with the fact that Swiss trains only had an 87.5% on-time rate in 2013.
The Swiss train system is so well-known for its punctuality that Apple stole its clock design for use on the iPhone. That's what we in the business call "a rep to keep." SBB, the Swiss national railway, is most certainly not keeping its rep, as it missed targets and delivered only slightly less than nine out of ten passengers less than three minutes within their scheduled arrival time, according to Le Matin.
That three-minute leeway, by the way, is the most stringent standard in the EU in Europe, and to suggest that Switzerland is in Europe would be just silly. I don't have the official policy off the top of my head, but I'm pretty sure in the US they don't really count you as late as long as you arrive in the same decade.
The delay is apparently caused by construction in Zurich or something, though the Swiss report doesn't really make it clear.
Either way, someone in Switzerland is probably being stoned to death right now. With a delicious mixture of cheeses and chocolates.
Photo credit: Paul Gover