Hull Trains diversion to St Pancras

[GraphitProjekt]

Apologies if there is already a thread about this.
On several weekends this month (including this one and the next) all Hull Trains services are diverting after Doncaster to run through Mexborough, Barrow Hill, Erewash Valley line and then all the way to St Pancras. I have two questions about this.
1. How do HT staff maintain route knowledge of essentially all of the MML? Are they running regular refreshers throughout the year? I'm surprised and impressed that this is considered economical.
2. Why don't they they use the wires south of Wigston? They are scheduled to run electric on the ~12 miles between Temple Hirst Jnc and Doncaster but nowhere else.
As more of a point of curiosity, I also find it interesting that they call at Leicester or sometimes Kettering which is funny because HT will appear on no-one's route map at those stations.

 

[yorkie]

Apologies if there is already a thread about this.

I believe previous threads will answer these questions; the forum search should find them, but you can also use Google, specifying "site:www.railforums.co.uk" as part of the search term, to exclude other sites.

https://www.google.com/search?q=Hull+Trains+st+pancras+diversions++site:www.railforums.co.uk

On several weekends this month (including this one and the next) all Hull Trains services are diverting after Doncaster to run through Mexborough, Barrow Hill, Erewash Valley line and then all the way to St Pancras. I have two questions about this.
1. How do HT staff maintain route knowledge of essentially all of the MML? Are they running regular refreshers throughout the year? I'm surprised and impressed that this is considered economical.

See reply from 2023:

On previous occasions they have had route conductors.

2. Why don't they they use the wires south of Wigston? They are scheduled to run electric on the ~12 miles between Temple Hirst Jnc and Doncaster but nowhere else.
As more of a point of curiosity, I also find it interesting that they call at Leicester or sometimes Kettering which is funny because HT will appear on no-one's route map at those stations.

See reply from August 2025 (someone may have a further update since then):

Do Hull Trains Class 802s usually run in 10-car formation on said diversions? If so then I would imagine TPTB will wait until EMR Class 810s are cleared for electric-mode 10-car operation first, which is probably still some time away as 10-car testing of any kind (including diesel-mode) still hasn't commenced.

 

[GraphitProjekt]

Fair enough, but Hull Trains are not running 10 car sets to St Pancras and won't ever be as the platforms are too short. In the Aug2025 reply people were saying there's no reason why a 5 car 802 couldn't run electric since 5 car 810s were and are. I think in August there hadn't been a Hull Trains MML diversion since EiS of the wires and definitely not since 810s running in passenger service. I had wondered if maybe their APC systems were somehow incompatible?

 

[JonathanH]

As more of a point of curiosity, I also find it interesting that they call at Leicester or sometimes Kettering which is funny because HT will appear on no-one's route map at those stations.

They don't pick up / set down passengers at intermediate stations but do change over route conductors for the diversions.

 

[Trainman40083]

Fair enough, but Hull Trains are not running 10 car sets to St Pancras and won't ever be as the platforms are too short. In the Aug2025 reply people were saying there's no reason why a 5 car 802 couldn't run electric since 5 car 810s were and are. I think in August there hadn't been a Hull Trains MML diversion since EiS of the wires and definitely not since 810s running in passenger service. I had wondered if maybe their APC systems were somehow incompatible?

I doubt any of the longer Hitachi IEPs have been tested on the MML electrified sections.

 

[cjxmc]

It looks like Hull Trains have added an extra service and some stops at Doncaster for the Sunday.

Picture shows a screenshot of trainline showing a direct service from London St.Pancras to Doncaster on the 22nd of February.

 

[mm333]

Unusual. 4 of the 6 HT trains made booked calls at Doncaster on the 22nd. HT could make Doncaster a set-down only going south/pick-up going north call on all the diverted services to maintain a Doncaster-Hull service.