"Goodbye Bush": Chant in crowded Washington Metro (Extra)

Jan 20, 2009, 12:15 GMT

Washington - Washington thrummed with excitement Tuesday morning as tens of thousands crowded into subway cars and poured through the streets to celebrate the end of one era and the beginning of another.

In just four hours, Barack Obama will take the reins of US power from George W Bush, and Metro riders at L'Enfant Plaza, stalled by train problems, began to sing.

'Goodbye Bush, Goodbye Bush,' over and over and over they chanted.

The mood was as much an outpouring of support for the country's first African-American president as it was a celebration of the Republican president's departure after eight increasingly unpopular years in the White House.

But the high expectations for Obama grew Tuesday along with the high spirits that pulsed through the record crowds.

Evan at 7 am, groups of revellers trying to keep together as they headed to the National Mall were losing people along the way.

At one point, a woman looking for a group member cried out: 'Jesus, where are you?'

Came the anonymous response from the crowd: 'He's at the mall in a couple of hours!'

Subway trains, opening at the unusually early hour of 4 am, pulled into platforms so overcrowded that conductors refused to open their doors, but went on to the next station.

The pressure was so great that at L'Enfant Plaza, the gates were opened for free travel.