Mystery continues to surround the death of a “flamboyant and spontaneous” student who was killed after being hit by a train.

Leke Adelaja, 20, was seen walking along the edge of a railway close to Canterbury East station before his death on November 27 last year.

The hard-working interior architecture student died instantly from multiple injuries, an inquest at the Guildhall in Sandwich heard yesterday.

He was filmed on CCTV entering the station at 4.45pm.

About 15 minutes later he was spotted by a passer-by, who alerted the emergency services, trespassing near to the tracks by New Dover Road and St Augustine’s Road.

At 5.20pm a train driver controlling the Faversham to Dover Priory service reported they may have struck a dog.

Coroner Geoffrey Smith said: “If I needed to make a finding of fact Leke was hit at 5.20pm. So there was 35 minutes between him walking onto the tracks and the collision.”

At an earlier hearing in July, Mr Adelaja’s housemate Daniel Van Orsouw told the court how his friend “looked troubled” prior to the incident.

He also noted how the 20-year-old left their home in Gordon Road without his keys or ubiquitous headphones.

In his narrative conclusion, Mr Smith stated he “was perfectly satisfied it was not suicide” and that he did not know why Mr Adelaja entered the tracks.

“There is no evidence to suggest he took his own life,” he added.

“There was no indication that Leke had any reason to want to take his own life.”

PC Phillip Pike, from the British Transport Police, told the inquest that, during a search of the area the following day, “it looked like someone tried to climb up the bank beside the tracks but slipped down again”.

PC Anthony Wood, also of the BTP, was one of the first officers on the scene.

He saw what he believed to be blood on the tracks and asked his control room to contact Network Rail to stop the trains.

However, four more, two in each direction, went by before the line was eventually closed.

It was also revealed that a second report was made to Kent Police just after 5.15pm, but it was not passed on to the British Transport Police “for two hours”.

Mr Smith said: “The family would be forgiven for thinking the agencies were unresponsive. It was explained to me actions have been taken to improve this in Kent Police.

“One has to bear in mind this was a busy time of day. There is a balance that National Rail had to take and there was unclear information as to whether there was something on the lines.

“There was no evidence of neglect. Any system can be improved but there is no complete answer.”

Mr Adelaja, originally from Nigeria, was a student at the University for the Creative Arts and a former pupil of Wilmington Grammar School in Dartford.

Said to be an extravagant student with a bubbly sense of humour and radiating smile, he had a flair for unique design and knew how to creatively think outside the box.