Ackislander

Am hearing from friends in UK of massive travel delays, especially by train despite rosy predictions in the Guardian online this morning.

Many flights cancelled yesterday. Can't reach friends in Brighton, so I assume power is off in their neighborhood, yet friend on seafront in Shoreham seems fine, though lost sections of fence.

Someone trying to get from Cambridge to Harwich for the ferry to the Hoek van Holland. Only one train from Cambridge yesterday and that to Stansted. Nothing onward from Stansted yet, so missed last night's ferry -- if it ran. May try bus through Colchester.

Any useful local reports for US travelers headed that way?

chartley

The main problems are trees which have blown onto the roads or railway lines, and damage to the overhead power lines on the railways. Ferries are often cancelled when the weather is bad.

Information on train cancellations, etc, can be found at http://www.nationalrail.co.uk/servic...ons/today.aspx.

Let's all hope U.S. travellers get the consideration they deserve.

annhig

Ackislander - in most places the winds were no way as strong as previously [the SW escaped more or less unscathed for example] but as with the hurricane in 1987, the SE seems to have copped it worst, though not as badly as 26 years ago [I know exactly when it was because my DD was born 3 weeks before and we lived right in the middle of where it hit!]

this time the forecast was far more accurate, and consequently preventative measures like ferry cancelations were put in place. but nothing can predict exactly which trees will hot which road, train and power lines - a gas main was severed and a house blown up with 2 people killed when a tree fell across it, for example.

So though a lot of people may have been inconvenienced, i think that we can expect things to get back to "normal" rather quicker than last time when we couldn't get anywhere for a week!

RM67

Quite a few of the rail companies decided to suspend the service up front in expectation of damage to overhead power lines and possible debris on the track. Locally (Greater Anglia) we were told no trains before midday. I think this was to save people waiting around in cold windy stations bad-temperdly with no specific info on when their service might run. Waiting at home bad temperdly with tea and Escape to The Country is much nicer.

There were fallen trees and overturned lorries on a number of roads, including quite major ones so obviously that caused delays too. I don't think the damage was as bad as 1987 so probably back to normal quite quickly as stated above.

RM67

PS Yes power is/was off in quite a few places. Ours (East Anglia, half way between London and Cambridge) was down for about 20 hours, but came on again late last night. I saw both national grid workers and BT engineers crossing muddy fields on my way to work this morning, presumably trying to get everyone in the area reconnected. I think the rail service round here - London to Cambridge and out to the east coast - is still pretty much fully suspended. Remember, most companies have apps and websites you can use for live info.

RM67

Actually Greater Anglia website has just updated to say services resuming now - Stansted express is running again, though half hourly rather than the normal 15 min intervals.

RM67

And finally, if you look up UK rail operators on Wiki you will see a list of all the rail companies currently operating so you know the names to look up individual services.

The bit you most want to be concerned with currently is all the rail operators listed under 'Network South East'.

flanneruk

1. The storm struck at just about the worst possible time for Monday travellers: after ten days of near-constant rain, so the ground was loose, and an exceptionally warm October, so the trees were still in full leaf, presenting a near-perfect sail to approaching winds.

Unsurpringly many collapsed. To add to the fun, it was the severest storm since transport got privatised: train and bus companies that self-insured in the 1980s now use third party insurers, who impose tougher "avoid being sued" restrictions.

Plane and ship companies are also more risk-averse than 30 years ago, not least because ports and airports have got a lot more congested

2. That's pretty much the sum total of the damage. BUT: the weather's now the October norm (ie colder and hence more prone to leaf-fall than the past four weeks have been) and suddenly the land's covered in porridge-ey leaves.

Boats, planes, roads and buses are more or less back to normal already, given the odd spot of repositioning. But trains, especially those routed through woodland, now face the perfect environment for "wrong sort of leaves on the line" delays. This is mostly a problem on commuter lines within 100 miles of London.

Sign of the times. 60 years ago, trees near railway lines were chopped back because of the danger of fire if a spark from a passing steam engine hit one. Now our conservation mania makes that impossible, so we all whinge when their October detritus gets ground into a near-adhesive paste. Instead of blaming the green fundamentalists, we blame the poor managers trying to run a railway.

hetismij2

It wasn't only the UK that had problems - from Brittany in the west to Sweden in the east, including parts of Belgium, most of the Netherlands and a swathe of northern Germany, the storm caused travel problems, damage and, sadly, deaths.
A ferry from Newcastle had to ride out the storm at sea as it couldn't dock in Ijmuiden. The 1100 passengers finally got off several hours late.
Things are pretty much back to normal today .

bilboburgler

Having been a good neighbour (in Yorkshire) to our local railway line and having insisted they cut back the trees, I can advise that there is no green lobby just managers who forgot to put "vegetation growth removal" in their budget lines..

Maybe in the rest of the UK?

PalenQ

Assuming that all ferries were cancelled and Eurostar trains scrubbed then it comes once again the old headline on tabloids which went something like this - "Channel Ferries Shut Down, Continent Isolated."

flanneruk

"the old headline on tabloids which went something like this - "Channel Ferries Shut Down, Continent Isolated.""

Which never appeared.

But is trotted out by American cliche addicts every time there's a drop of rain.

PalenQ

well I mean to say that story was indeed apocryphal. And it were fog that closed the ferries in that apocryphal story.