Eurostar passengers caught on trains in a single day as energy outage chaos continues into New Year’s Eve with extra companies cancelled and lengthy delays anticipated

Eurostar passengers were stuck for hours on trains overnight as chaos continued after a power outage in the Channel Tunnel crippled travel ahead of the New Year.

Rail services faced ongoing delays and cancellations this morning after some travellers were stuck for more than eight hours on trains from London last night.

It follows Eurostar axing all its London to Europe services yesterday when an overhead power supply problem and a failed LeShuttle train blocked all routes.

Some trains resumed on the single available line yesterday evening but these were delayed when Eurostar faced further issues with rail infrastructure overnight.

One passenger told the Daily Mail they were booked on the cancelled 11.04am from St Pancras to Lille train yesterday before moving their tickets to a 6.04pm service.

They boarded that train at 7pm then waited for train crew to arrive from an inbound train, and left London at 9pm – due into Lille at 11.10pm French time (10.10pm GMT).

However their train halted before entering the Channel Tunnel at about 9.30pm, before the power went off and they sat with emergency lighting until about 2.30am.

A locomotive then arrived to move the train to an area with power and they were sat at 3.30am near Folkestone, having been stuck on the train for more than eight hours.

The passenger told the Mail just after 3.30am that they were awaiting news on whether they will get to Lille for the New Year or have to return to London.

Dennis Van Der Steen was on a train from London to Amsterdam which left St Pancras at 8.49pm last night, but stopped before it reached the Channel Tunnel.

He said the service waited for six hours at the entrance to the tunnel with no power, before turning back to London.

Mr Van Der Steen told BBC News: ‘We hope to be home for New Year’s Eve and celebrate with family and friends. The train is dark, and the passengers are sleeping and waiting, and they’re also very worried.’

Meanwhile a French passenger on the 7.01pm train to Paris last night also told the BBC they were stuck on board the service in London as of 3am.

He described the mood as ‘pretty chill’ with ‘people sleeping and kids playing’, but the crew were ‘on no sleep’ and were dealing with some ‘angry passengers’.

Another passenger stuck overnight on a train from London was X user @yssf_io who complained at 1.28am that there was ‘no electricity, no toilet, no info’.

He tweeted at 0.43am that he was ‘currently stuck in the Eurostar, it’s been five hours’ – and at 6.09am said ‘we have electricity, eight hours after being stopped’, adding that they had ‘finally’ started moving towards Paris at 7.34am.

A statement on the Eurostar website this morning said: ‘Services have resumed today following a power issue in the Channel Tunnel yesterday and some further issues with rail infrastructure overnight.

‘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. Please check for live updates on the status of your train on the Train status and timetables page.’

Today’s first train from St Pancras to Gare du Nord station in Paris, scheduled for 6.01am, was cancelled.

The next train, the 6.31am departure to Paris, left at 7.06am and is due into the Gare du Nord at 10.24am local time – over half an hour after its scheduled arrival time of 9.49am. 

This was listed as delayed ‘due to a technical problem on another train’ in the tunnel. 

All other services were showing as scheduled on the company’s website as of 7.30am. 

LeShuttle was also affected by the power issue. After warning of six-hour delays at the Folkestone terminal yesterday, the operator said that had dropped to 30 minutes this morning.

Six-hour waits remained in Calais, but passengers were advised to check-in as planned.

The Independent’s travel correspondent Simon Calder said this morning that it was ‘an absolutely miserable day for at least 25,000 passengers’ yesterday.

He told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: ‘Eurostar in general runs pretty smoothly, as does LeShuttle – but when it goes wrong it goes wrong, it goes very wrong indeed.’

Speaking about the combination of an overhead power supply issue and a broken down LeShuttle train, Mr Calder added: ‘If you get two problems converging like that, then you don’t really have much hope.

‘At this time of year, everyone’s very invested in their journeys… there’s much more pressure than you might get on a wet Wednesday in February.’

The Channel Tunnel accommodates Eurostar services as well as LeShuttle vehicle-carrying trains between the UK and France.

Getlink, which operates the Channel Tunnel, said that ‘an incident related to the power supply to trains occurred last night in part of the Channel Tunnel, affecting train and shuttle traffic’. 

Yesterday, Eurostar staff at St Pancras station were seen handing out water bottles to people waiting by a cordon who were caught up in the delays.

Cars hoping to cross the Eurotunnel caused traffic jams on the approach to the Folkestone terminal.

LeShuttle passenger Tim Brown said he had been stuck in his car on the train at the Calais terminal for more than three hours with ‘no access to food or water’.

Mr Brown, who was trying to get back to the UK after spending Christmas in Germany, was travelling with his dogs Rilo and Vinnie who he said are ‘hating life’ stuck on the train.

‘The fact that nobody has come around offering everybody a bottle of water is what has shocked me the most,’ he said.

‘I know things happen, but surely that would be an easy way to help.’