Eurostar, the operator of high-speed trains through the Channel tunnel, was ordered by French President Nicholas Sarkozy to resume regular service by Tuesday 22 December after he met with Guillaume Pepy, the head of the SNCF, the French national railways operator. The French president also demanded that appropriate information be supplied to passengers, in a communique 21 December.
Thousands of people have been unable to travel by rail in either direction since Eurostar was forced to cancel service Saturday because extremely cold weather caused condensation to shut down electric locomotives. Service has been intermittent since then. A normal weekend sees 31,000 passengers a day, but cuts and delays have left many unable to travel. Passengers have had to make their own way home.
BA has added flights to accommodate some of the stranded, but airfares are much higher than usual on the route, reports the Wall Street Journal.
SNCF and Eurostar UK jointly manage train operations through the tunnel.
Links to other sites: Daily Telegraph, Reuters
News story, GenevaLunch, 21 December 2009.
Filed under: World news
Tags: Britain, Channel tunnel, Eurostar, Eurotunnel, France, Guillaume Pepy, Nicholas Sarkozy, SNCF, UK
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One Response to “Eurostar passengers still stranded by the thousands”
December 23rd, 2009 at 3:15 am
3 days to get home!! Held “hostage” on the Eurostar at CGD airport on Saturday to avoid speaking to the press, misinformed on Sunday, then a europen tour on Monday. The 6.25 train to Amsterdam was cancelled from G Du Nord, the 8.25 didn’t have a driver and left 80 minutes late – then lost another hour during the journey, i missed my 13.45 flight from Amterdam to London….the saga went on but most of all Eurostar didn’t want to know or hear about us. The attitude was GO AWAY and deal with this yourselves – we will throw money at you but JUST GO AWAY – when i got to Amsterdam, the shock of someone being nice to me almost reduced me to tears, having been stuck with the French for so long it was the first time for days that this had happened.