WCML wires down and disruption

All six lines open to trains from 1pm. Electric trains will free-wheel under damaged wires on the ‘fast’ northbound line. Repairs will resume overnight tonight.

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A fault with the signalling system between Milton Keynes Central and Rugby / Northampton has resulted in all lines being blocked. Trains are also impacted by damage to the overhead electric wires North Wembley Junction.
Avanti West Coast services have also been delayed by the fire alarms sounding earlier today at Preston station.
How is this affecting the train service?
Trains are unable to depart London Euston until at least 14:00 and all other services will be held in platforms where possible.
Journey times may be extended by up to 2 hours.
London Northwestern Railway services between Birmingham New Street and London Euston will terminate at Northampton.
https://www.nationalrail.co.uk/service_disruptions/244465.aspx

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Exile2828 said:

Not a good few days at all on the West coast mainline.


And there is now a block on all trains as there has been a train data/signal failure around Hanslope junction.


Could be a fun journey home!

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Yesterday, we hoped to reopen the railway before the first service was set to leave Euston. What was really frustrating was the surprise nature of the issues we faced in the early hours of yesterday morning. They took us by surprise. They took you, our passengers, by surprise. I’m gutted to have let you down.

I feel I owe you, the people we exist to serve, an explanation. An open and honest run-down on what happened and what my colleagues and I have done to fix things.

What happened?
On Saturday (7 March, 1:39pm) a train travelling at 125mph brought down 1,000 metres of overhead wires in the South Kenton area in Wembley, northwest London.

The train’s pantograph (the point of contact from the train to the electric wires) caught a bit of wire that was out of place. As it takes time for a train travelling at that speed to stop, it pulled a 1km stretch of wire down.

A full investigation is still under way to find out the cause of this unwanted pantograph contact.

But my immediate goal is to get passengers safely moving again. The West Coast main line is the busiest mixed-use (passenger and freight) in Europe. Any disruption is bad. But a major problem like this is really bad for the people we serve.

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C J Snarzell said:

Avanti West Coast have had a very difficult 24 hours in the North West. There was a person hit by a train yesterday just after 6pm leading to a block on between Lancaster & Preston. Then there's been an emergency evacuation at Preston this morning which again has caused disruption.

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southernyoshi said:

Out of curiosity, what’s actually happened to the signalling system down there? Seems to be a pretty big problem. Come to think of it, what brought down such a huge length of wire on Saturday?!

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Disruption at London Euston: what happened and what we are doing to fix it

James Dean, managing director of West Coast Mainline South route

Firstly, I’m truly sorry to Euston passengers who have been impacted by delays and cancellations over the past few days caused by damaged overhead electric wires at South Kenton.

What’s really frustrating about this is the surprise nature of today’s problems. They took us by surprise. They took you, our passengers, by surprise. I’m gutted to have let you down.

I feel I owe you, the people we exist to serve, an explanation. An open and honest run-down on what happened and what my colleagues and I have been doing to fix things…

It was at 3:30 am today when I was faced with a grim choice. Two options. Each option was going to result in disruption to passengers …

But before I get to that bit, I’ll try to explain what led up to that moment.

What happened?
On Saturday (7 March, 1:39pm) a train travelling at 125mph brought down 1,000 metres of overhead wires in the South Kenton area in Wembley, northwest London.

The train’s pantograph (the point of contact from the train to the electric wires) caught a bit of wire that was out of place. As it takes time for a train travelling at that speed to stop, it pulled a 1km stretch of wire down.

A full investigation is under way to find out the cause of this unwanted pantograph contact.

But my immediate goal is to get passengers safely moving again. The West Coast main line is the busiest mixed-use (passenger and freight) in Europe. Any disruption is bad. But a major problem like this is really bad for the people we serve.

What did we do next?
This line (one out of six in total) had to be closed and the electricity turned off due to the extensive damage. Specialist teams and equipment are needed to fix damage like this. This includes a wiring train of which there are only a handful in the country. In reality we needed 16 hours non stop to do the work but we needed to only disrupt the railway overnight.

Immediately my teams worked to pull together the right people and kit to fix it but unfortunately the earliest we could do this was Sunday night (8 March). We had to block all six lines initially, so night-time was the least bad time to do this work.

I spoke with my colleagues at Southern Rail, Avanti, London Overground, Caledonian Sleeper and London North Western Railway to look at how, collectively, we could keep passengers moving on alternative lines. We agreed a reduced timetable and worked together to inform passengers of the upcoming disruption.

What has been done so far to fix it?
Work took place on Sunday night into Monday morning (9pm – 6am). Our teams removed the damaged 1km of wire and installed 1km of new wire. This allowed us to reopen the line on Monday morning to diesel trains, freeing up space so the other electrified lines could run electric trains on Monday.

Further work needed to take place last night (9pm – 6am) to install a complex assembly called a neutral section which insulates two feeder stations from each other and install more equipment whilst checking the alignment of the new overhead wires to fully reopen the line.

Overhead lines need to be at specific heights from the rail to ensure consistent electrical contact. They are also installed with a stagger or zig zag alignment to ensure an even wear across the pantograph of the train. This is a complex procedure for 1km of wire.

Why didn’t you finish the work last night?
While we worked on the overhead wires last night, the team found further damage to the supporting structures outside of the 1km stretch. Specifically this was the equipment around the neutral section.

Back in 2002, then US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfled uttered his famous line on “known unknowns” and “unknown unknowns.” It was in the small hours of this morning that I realised we’d just uncovered the latter. This is not an excuse. We must do better in future. And we will. But I hope it gives you an insight into what was happening out there in the cold and dark as we discovered more damage than had previously been detected.

My heart sank. We needed to act immediately. The work needed to fix the other damaged equipment delayed the job. And, infuriatingly, this meant we disrupted passengers again this morning.

Faced with a difficult choice…
So at 3:30am this morning I was faced with two main choices:

1. Complete as much work as possible so the line could reopen – electrically charged but with trains lowering the pantograph under the affected area and coasting underneath. We wouldn’t be able to do this until 12noon due to the time needed to remove the equipment used last night to fix the other damage.
2. Keep the line closed with some of the equipment on site so we can easily repair the damage tonight.

Neither of those were ideal because I knew passengers still wouldn’t get the full service they deserve.

To cite Rumsfeld again, if we’d known the full extent of the overhead wire damage, I would have told passengers and train companies that this was going to take longer to fix.

But we didn’t know what we didn’t know until we knew – and by then it was too late to avoid impacting you further.

For that, I am truly sorry.

So what’s next?
Our engineers will be back out tonight (9pm – 6am) to complete our repairs. We are planning to fully reopen the line tomorrow ready for start of service.

Needless to say, we will leave nothing to chance tonight. I never want a repeat of this morning. I never want to let you down like that again.

I hope there are no further issues in the area. We surveyed as much as we could last night before our engineers needed to safely leave site to run trains on the unaffected lines.

I’d like to thank all passengers who have had to bear with us during this issue.

James.

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LNW-GW Joint said:

It's good to hear the detail.
I'd like to hear the same sort of explanation for the disruption today to the signalling at Hanslope and the closure of Preston station for many hours.
Remember they spent at least £8 billion on it recently.
The WCML has not been remotely right for 4 days on the trot now.

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Bald Rick said:

‘Recently’ being 12-22 years ago. And I’m reasonably sure not one pound of it was spent at Preston.

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LNW-GW Joint said:

It's good to hear the detail.
I'd like to hear the same sort of explanation for the disruption today to the signalling at Hanslope and the closure of Preston station for many hours.
Remember they spent at least £8 billion on it recently.
The WCML has not been remotely right for 4 days on the trot now.

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AndrewE said:

Apparently the fire brigade left after a few minutes. This strikes me as a classic "computer says no" / lack of initiative situation. Given the importance of Preston both on the WCML and as a junction, I am very surprised that they didn't find everybody they could and put on enhanced fire warden patrolling until the alarm could be reset.
20 years ago Euston was under real threat of closure because of the failures or inadequacy of its fire alarm system, but they implemented a variety of enhanced inspection and other measures to keep it open until they finally got it done.

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AndrewE said:

I didn't read it as "absolutely impossible to stop it ringing." They must have someone who knows how to isolate areas (if not why not?)... so why not isolate all of them? And put all staff on overtime patrolling.

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