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Friday 18 Sep 2020

Passengers warned Crewe signalling failure disruption will continue this weekend

Region & Route:

North West & Central

| North West & Central: North West

| North West & Central: Central

Passengers are being thanked for their patience as engineers continue to fix a major fault with railway signalling affecting trains between Manchester, Stoke, Birmingham and London.

Specialist teams from Network Rail and the signalling system manufacturer are working around the clock in Crewe and at the Manchester South Control Centre to find the fault and fix it.

Engineers have repaired and checked miles of signalling cable to try to restore the signalling.

Usually this resolves a signalling outage but the technical team and manufacturer is now focusing its investigations on an unprecedented computer software issue.

The complexity of the fault means that trains will continue to be disrupted this weekend.

Phil James, Network Rail’s North West route director, said: “I appreciate this signalling failure in Crewe is a huge inconvenience to passengers and I’d just like to really apologise. I’ve had engineers working all night alongside the signalling manufacturer to find out what’s gone wrong.

“I’m hugely sorry this is going to have to continue into the weekend. The emergency timetable will remain in place and I’d urge all passengers planning to travel to check www.nationalrail.co.uk as we continue to find the cause and fix it.”

Nick Westcott, Operations Director at Avanti West Coast, said: “This is an extremely unusual situation and, whilst we are working hard with Network Rail to minimise disruption to journeys, we are conscious of the potential difficulty in maintaining social distancing given the much reduced service we are able to run. With that in mind, we are asking customers on our Manchester route to only make essential journeys if travelling between Friday 18 – Sunday 20 September.

“Customers who have booked to travel to or from Manchester, Stockport, Wilmslow or Macclesfield this weekend can travel on any of our Manchester services until Monday 21st September. Alternatively, if customers would prefer to cancel their journey, refunds will be given without any fee being charged.”

The signalling issue is affecting all trains between Crewe and Manchester and Macclesfield and Manchester.

This is having a knock-on impact to services to Birmingham, Stoke, London and the wider rail network.

Passengers are urged to check with their train operator or National Rail Enquiries to find out how their journey is impacted.

For a detailed blog on how Network Rail is working to fix the issue click here: www.networkrail.co.uk/working-to-repair-a-major-signalling-fault-in-crewe/