A 13-year-old girl who died after falling from a bridge on to a speeding train had left her house to go out for a barefoot night-time run because she could not sleep, an inquest heard.
Zoe Miller, who grew up in South Africa and moved to Berkhamsted in Hertfordshire with her family last year, often found it diffcult to get to sleep and would go out barefoot, day or night, to burn off energy.
On April 22, the schoolgirl left her house for a run after going to bed at 10pm and slipped off a brick parapet on a nearby bridge.
Detective Inspector Andrew Rose, of British Transport Police, said Zoe would have been disorientated in the dark as the train came along and she would have lost her balance and fallen.
She landed on a south-bound train travelling through Berkhamsted rail station at around 60mph at 11.45pm to London Euston.
Residents of two nearby properties heard a bang and also saw a flash from the area, the officer said.
Her body was discovered by a train driver at 6am the next day.
Her parents, who had locked the back door of the family home the night before, woke up to find it unlocked the next morning.
Police found her footprints along a series of three parapets on the bridge.
Graham Danbury, deputy coroner for Hertfordshire, recorded a verdict of accidental death.
He said: "It was usual for her to go out barefoot because she was used to that and would want to run around to burn off some energy.
"She went out of the back garden towards the bridge.
"The great likelihood was she walked along the lower barrier on to the parapet of the bridge... the train approached at speed and her disorientation would have had a disturbing effect to her being on the parapet, losing her footing and falling on to the train with tragic results.
"I am entirely satisfied this was an accident nothing more and nothing less.
"She went out for a run and potentially chose to be in the wrong place when the train passed by."
Detectives studied Zoe's mobile phone and laptop for information and also read her diary and there was nothing to suggest she was unhappy.
During the day of her death she had played with a friend and told her she would see her "tomorrow" on the first day back at school after the Easter holidays.
