When power cuts hit the railway
The Heathrow Airport power outage caused chaos to the plans of passengers – railways, including LNER, Northern and Eurostar, coming to the rescue of many stranded passengers. Railways, however, are not immune to such incidents, as these two extracts from the best selling ‘A Funny Thing Happened on the Train to London’ illustrate. Due to be published very soon and only a few unreserved slots available in the 1,000 print run – this being the second print run of the popular title. https://www.chimewhistle.co.uk/shop/p/a-funny-thing-happened-on-the-train-to-london
A day that will forever be engraved on the memories of Chiltern staff and passengers, for all the wrong reasons,is 11 October 2021.All was well in Chiltern land until 11.45 when the London Marylebone signalling panels controlling the route as far as Ayhno Junction, just south of Banbury, suffered a power failure. In addition to stranding passengers and trains , a block to traffic from Birmingham was ordered to the West Midlands Signalling Centre which controls the route north of Ayhno Junction. Signalling engineers soon discovered the source of the chaos and were far from impressed when it was traced back to contractors, without Network Rail plant knowledge, working on the signalling supply point. The contractors had caused a power blip, which in turn sent the uninterruptible power supply into bypass mode, depriving the signalling screens of power. Normal signalling was not resumed until 16.21, but not before 68 trains had been cancelled, 19 part cancelled and 126 delayed – resulting in 3,249 delay minutes and a member of contractor staff being ‘for cause’ screened.
It wasn’t the first time Chiltern passengers had found themselves in the middle of a power supply problem. HS2 is already a controversial topic in the Chiltern area, years before the first trains are due to run. The company was at the centre of Chiltern train service mayhem on 19 March 2020 when signalling engineers at South Ruislip, working on behalf of HS2, caused two Chiltern services to pass red signals. The engineers had attempted to divert the signalling power supply, but then discovered that the alternative supply was faulty – this power supply blip caused signals to revert to red in the face of approaching trains. Trains affected were the 08.49 Gerrards Cross to London Marylebone and 08.02 Oxford to London Marylebone, both being too near the signals when they suddenly changed from green to red. The escapade caused 61 trains to be delayed, resulting in a total of 731 delay minutes.