Paris (France) (AFP) – Traffic slowly resumed Wednesday in the Channel tunnel after an electricity failure halted train trips connecting London to the European mainland, as frazzled passengers arrived in France after hours trapped in a powerless train. The Eurostar online timetable, however, still announced some delays as it reported “knock-on impacts” on New Year’s Eve. Travellers making journeys in the busy run-up to New Year had been left scrambling to find alternatives after the operator postponed all services between London, Paris, Amsterdam, and Brussels.
“Services have resumed today following a power issue in the Channel Tunnel yesterday and some further issues with rail infrastructure overnight,” Eurostar said on its website. “We plan to run all of our services today; however, due to knock-on impacts, there may still be some delays and possible last-minute cancellations.” Several Eurostar passengers, however, spent hours stuck in a train overnight, according to media reports. Contacted by AFP, Eurostar did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
One man told the BBC he had boarded the 19:01 train from London to Paris, but at 0300 GMT, he was still sitting in the train at the entrance to the tunnel. France’s BFMTV reported passengers were left waiting in the night on a train without electricity, heating, or functioning toilets. “Nothing electrical is working. It’s always the same information — there’s a serious problem,” a passenger named Herve told the broadcaster from a train that arrived in Lille early on Wednesday with an 11-hour delay.
In London, a train left and passengers boarded another on Wednesday morning, an AFP reporter said. Eurostar had on Tuesday warned passengers to postpone their journeys to a different date and warned them of severe delays as well as last-minute cancellations. As well as the power problem, there was also a failed LeShuttle train in the Channel tunnel, the 31-mile (50-kilometre) undersea rail link between Folkestone in England and the Calais area in France. LeShuttle operates vehicle-carrying trains between Folkestone in southeast England and Calais in northern France.
Crowds of stranded travellers, many with suitcases, swelled at London’s St Pancras International station and at the Gare du Nord in Paris as they were notified that their end-of-year holiday plans were being thrown into doubt. “I’m disappointed. We were going to do New Year’s Eve in Paris,” Jessica, a 21-year-old business coordinator travelling with friends, told AFP in London. In Paris, Chaitan Patel, a 46-year-old American, was determined to get back to London. “We’re looking at every option: plane, car — but even flying is difficult,” he told AFP.
Katherine Jordan, a 39-year-old Briton, said she too hoped to find a flight — ideally so she and her nine-year-old son Oscar could make it back on Wednesday for New Year’s Eve. She said her son had just told her to “stay calm because there’s no point in getting annoyed.”
A record-high 19.5 million passengers travelled on Eurostar last year, up nearly five percent on 2023, driven by demand from visitors to the Olympics and Paralympics in Paris. Eurostar has held a monopoly on passenger services through the tunnel linking Britain and France since it opened in 1994. But British entrepreneur Richard Branson — the man behind the Virgin airline — has vowed to launch a rival service. Italy’s Trenitalia has also said it intends to compete with Eurostar on the Paris-London route by 2029.
Tuesday’s disruption was the latest to affect Eurostar at a time when the company has faced criticism over its high prices, especially on the Paris-London route. An electrical fault forced the cancellation of Eurostar services and severe delays on others in August. The theft of cables on train tracks in northern France caused two days of problems in June.
© 2024 AFP
