Manchester power outage halts trains across North West and Midlands

An electrical failure at the Manchester Rail Operating Centre near Ashburys station shortly before 2 p.m. on 6 August caused a signalling outage that halted services across Greater Manchester, the north‑west of England and the Midlands. Network Rail warned of “major rail disruption” with cancellations, delays of up to an hour and revised timetables for operators including Avanti West Coast, Northern, TransPennine Express, East Midlands Railway, CrossCountry, London Northwestern Railway and Transport for Wales. Train operators issued a “do not travel” notice, relaxed ticket restrictions and arranged rail‑replacement bus services; the Greater Manchester Bee Network accepted tickets on its buses and Metrolink for affected passengers. Engineers worked through the night to restore signalling, and Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander said she was receiving regular updates and expected disruption to continue until the end of the day, with possible knock‑on effects on Friday morning. Quotes from officials included Network Rail’s North West route director Chris Wright: “I’m extremely sorry for the disruption today… our engineers are working tirelessly to restore the signalling systems,” and TransPennine Express’s Andrew McClements: “We’re not out of the woods yet.”