Heatwave 22-27 June - effect on the UK Railway

[Bald Rick]

my memory is that when CWR became widespread there were incidents of buckling and it was realised that heavier sleepers and big ballast shoulders were needed - in addition to "breather"rail joints.

Whereas jointed rail has lots of joints all of which which can "flex" longitudinally.

Breather joints are usually only a feature between CWR and not CWR, eg unstrengthened switches and crossings.

The issue with joints is that when the gaps are closed there is ‘nowhere to go’ if it gets hotter, except sideways.

 

[mike57]

I think the Meto warnings are a mess.

And add to that the current warning matrix doesn't convey what is needed in other ways, trying to 'wrap up' risk and impact in one matrix results in a situation where a 'low impact' event that is almost certain to happen will attract the same warning, yellow, as a high impact potential 'red' warning event that is still only a possibility. In terms of planning both at a personal, and corporate and government level the response will be different. As an example a wind warning, a base yellow warning that is going to happen may mean specific activities may be affected, but wider impacts will low or non existant, so unless you are planning on for example going camping you will probably ignore it. However a yellow warning which may lead to a Red wind warning will mean a lot of people and groups may need to take action or be prepared to change plans.

 

[TheLastMinute]

I also belong to a couple of meteorological special interest groups, and it has certainly been a discussion point on there. There are a number of different forecast models which cover the UK, and they are in broad agreement about Friday and even Saturday being as warm or even warmer in the east. The only real divergence is maximum temperatures, which are all in the 'nasty humid very unpleasant' range but vary by maybe 2-3C and the possibility of thunderstorms breaking out again.

The Metoffice warnings come in for a lot of criticism for the very reason you have stated. Anybody who just relied on the warning would be saying "OK Wednesday and Thursday are not good days to venture out on the train, but Friday will be cooler, there isnt even a yellow warning" My own view is inaccurate or misleading warnings are actually worse than no warning system. I realise forecasting is not a precise art, but all the signals are there, same as today and tomorrow, and have been for at least 24 hours.

From watching this morning's Met Office forecast video, it looks like they will likely be issuing a heat warning for Friday later on today. To be fair, it is still 40 hours away and there was less certainty about how quicky the less hot air would move in. The trend of each model run over the past few days has been to slow the progress so the forcast for Friday is now hotter than it was on Monday.

Looking at the current forecast, the risk area for Friday would be restricted to northeast of London and the Midlands as these areas have has the persistent heat over a few days which is what creates the wider impacts.

 

[YorkC]

Despite the NR guidance being about the danger of travelling when it's really hot and not about disruption, Grand Central are telling people that they can't travel when it's cooler https://x.com/GC_Rail/status/2069651988661334149

 

[IlkleyRunner]

With regard to warnings, keep in mind that the Met Office warnings are primarily about risk to people. Risks to infrastructure etc are secondary to that. So whilst rail infrastructure may be equally badly effected on Friday by high temperatures, the current forecast suggests that the humidity is dropping from tomorrow, so the immediate danger to people (that the wet bulb temperature goes above what is easily sustainable for a normal person) will be reduced.

 

[1D54]

05:48 New St - Stansted this morning was cancelled due to the extreme weather but that didn't stop the following service running. It did in fact run but only as far as Leicester then returned to Birmingham at 06:17, a service that XC claimed had originally been cancelled before being reinstated. All very strange and leaves me wondering if these conditions are/will be used as an excuse to cancel services that have no crews.

 

[Bletchleyite]

OPSTA (the Ormskirk, Preston and Southport Travellers' Association) seem to be suggesting Northern have been made to withdraw the 769s by Network Rail, presumably due to reliability issues (though it isn't clear if they'd have more issues in the heat or if the concern is them breaking down stranding other non air conditioned trains). This was in an e-mail so no link sorry:

By now many of you will already know this and if affected have made alternative arrangements.
OPSTA was not notified until very late Monday evening that this would happen and Northern's general communication from what we have seen has been poor.
So far we have only received very lacking and unsatisfactory answers to our questions and concerns.
However there is evidence we are seeking to verify that Network Rail instructed Northern it could not operate its Class 769 trains which of course is meant to be the mainstay for delivering our service.
We are pushing back hard on what again is a disregard by Northern of its customers and what looks like more damning evidence against the 769s and what Northern now concedes is a "challenging fleet position" whilst it bolsters what it is providing on the east side of its network.
Any comment and feedback from you is welcome.

 

[Russel]

05:48 New St - Stansted this morning was cancelled due to the extreme weather but that didn't stop the following service running. It did in fact run but only as far as Leicester then returned to Birmingham at 06:17, a service that XC claimed had originally been cancelled before being reinstated. All very strange and leaves me wondering if these conditions are/will be used as an excuse to cancel services that have no crews.

I'd be more surprised if that wasn't the case.

 

[sh24]

G-NLSE the Network rail helicopter has done a few circles over my house (near Waterloo) and seems to be on tour of London stations. It used for track monitoring or similar?

 

[Bletchleyite]

05:48 New St - Stansted this morning was cancelled due to the extreme weather but that didn't stop the following service running. It did in fact run but only as far as Leicester then returned to Birmingham at 06:17, a service that XC claimed had originally been cancelled before being reinstated. All very strange and leaves me wondering if these conditions are/will be used as an excuse to cancel services that have no crews.

More likely I'd think that more crews are calling in sick. It is quite hot - yesterday I was driving to Bicester and saw a Stagecoach X5 stopped in a layby with what looked like the driver (the colours were right for Stagecoach uniform) standing bent over in front of the bus vomiting, presumably from heatstroke.

 

[Pnerick81]

Yes and no.

With the same high rail temperature, and same track conditions (track curvature, stability, ballast condition, usage), jointed track (especially bullhead rail) is more likely to buckle than continuoisly welded rail (CWR)

However to counter this, mitigations are implemented for jointed track at a lower temperature.

Thanks for that . If the temperatures are correct over the next 2 days . Is track buckling something that could happen . I realise it depends on other conditions .

 

[Coleridge]

All very strange and leaves me wondering if these conditions are/will be used as an excuse to cancel services that have no crews.

Crosscountry frequently cancels trains between Cardiff and Birmingham New Street due to lack of train crew, and today it has taken the opportunity to cancel every service, claiming it is due to the extreme weather.

 

[TFN]

Elizabeth line have cancelled the AM/PM Peak Liverpool St - Gidea Pk services, reduced Reading to 2tph in the AM/PM peak, and reduced T4 services to 2tph all day.

 

[fishball]

Hello all,

Today (24 June) marks the third consecutive day that all Yorkshire Flyer services have been cancelled.

Whilst considering the heat today cancellations are more understandable, this should not have been an issue for the previous two days. Any idea as to whether there is a wider operational issue behind these cancellations?

Thanks.

 

[david l]

Hello all,

Today (24 June) marks the third consecutive day that all Yorkshire Flyer services have been cancelled.

Whilst considering the heat today cancellations are more understandable, this should not have been an issue for the previous two days. Any idea as to whether there is a wider operational issue behind these cancellations?

Thanks.

Have a look at the rest of Northern...

 

[ivorytoast28]

With regard to warnings, keep in mind that the Met Office warnings are primarily about risk to people. Risks to infrastructure etc are secondary to that. So whilst rail infrastructure may be equally badly effected on Friday by high temperatures, the current forecast suggests that the humidity is dropping from tomorrow, so the immediate danger to people (that the wet bulb temperature goes above what is easily sustainable for a normal person) will be reduced.

That makes sense, the met office wouldn't be planning for the railways. But you'd like to hope the railways would at least look at the forecast and adjust their messaging accordingly.

The do not travels are still all for today/tomorrow despite many routes being forecast to have higher temperatures Friday when a lot of people are being told to travel

With the MML closed for the foreseeable future I tried to ask LNER about tickets dated today/tomorrow using their easement to travel after Friday and it was they don't know whether EMR will have ticket acceptance with LNER after Friday. We know the MML is closed on the weekend anyway for engineering works so doubt there will be anything specific forthcoming either

 

[Class 466]

It's been listed on the Northern site every day this week as being heat related. Northern had over 400 cancellations planned yesterday & today due to the heat.

 

[david l]

It's been listed on the Northern site every day this week as being heat related. Northern had over 400 cancellations planned yesterday & today due to the heat.

Up to today, what heat...in Northern!!

 

[Haywain]

With the MML closed for the foreseeable future

Depends what you call the foreseeable future. I fully expect the MML to be up and running by next Monday..

 

[fishball]

It's been listed on the Northern site every day this week as being heat related. Northern had over 400 cancellations planned yesterday & today due to the heat.

It's been listed on the Northern site every day this week as being heat related. Northern had over 400 cancellations planned yesterday & today due to the heat.

I see, thanks. I suppose it is an easy diagram to cancel with more alternatives available and without too much complication.

 

[brad465]

I was due to travel from Taunton-Crayford tomorrow, but will be postponing it given the travel advice. I'm really hoping they extend the grace period to Saturday, as Friday is still very hot at the eastern end of the journey.

 

[GuyGibsonVC]

Not weather related but disruption this morning north of Newcastle due to swans and cygnets on the line.

They were quite hard to wrangle on the ballast, so a local wildlife group helped to gather them in.

 

[Snow1964]

Seems the red warning area has been changed, the area covered is now roughly a pentagon shape, excluding Essex, then excluding anything within about 25 miles of south coast, then a line from Taunton to Swansea, a line to Birmingham then to Essex border (so not St Neots northwards)

UK weather warnings

Met Office UK weather warnings for rain, wind, snow, ice, fog, thunderstorm, lightning and extreme heat.

weather.metoffice.gov.uk

Appears though plenty of train services outside the red area are being disrupted, as are some completely outside amber area (although those completely outside amber and red area seems to be a poor reason to me)

 

[The exile]

More likely I'd think that more crews are calling in sick.

Or suddenly having to deal with the consequences of school-closures.

 

[sammyg901]

1615 Marylebone to Oxford today was absolutely horrendous. Full and standing on departure and the very weak AC was struggling. Only a three-car 165.

Meanwhile six carriages sat waiting to do a Wembley Stadium shuttle for Harry Styles. I know there's a balance to strike and you don't want overcrowding on a mass scale for an event, but a sensible compromise would have been having more peak services strengthened then having that stock ready for the concert kicking out (doesn't mean you have to run absolutely no additionals pre-concert of course) on its return to Marylebone.

I know it won't be as simple as that and it will have been done at very short notice (being someone who does the same thing for a living) but the end result for passengers has been extremely poor.

I suspect needing to maintain the service for Wembley (especially afterward) made it very difficult to reduce / restructure the service at such short notice. Today and tomorrow is an emergency timetable that I imagine is more or less off the shelf ready and services are running mainly as 5 car. Though 1H04 Stourbridge Junction was a 5 car 165 - good for capacity - not super comfortable for anyone who did have a long journey! 1Y04 0815 from Oxford was a 2 car which is unfortunate but judging by the amount of school closures and how quiet the roads are I suspect commuting today will be a lot less than normal.

 

[GordonT]

Not weather related but disruption this morning north of Newcastle due to swans and cygnets on the line.

They were quite hard to wrangle on the ballast, so a local wildlife group helped to gather them in.

The delays led, inevitably, to trains being further delayed (in hotter than usual weather) queueing for suitable platform availability at Newcastle. Newcastle's Platforms 2, 3 & 4 can be a very real bottleneck given the volume of trains which require to use them. In disruption (similar to Preston) the need for Scottish crews working southbound trains to have their break at Newcastle then take over northbound trains can often compound disruption. None of which has any obvious solution.

 

[eastwestdivide]

Up to today, what heat...in Northern!!

Well here in the S Yorks part of Northern-land, yesterday I had the house in full heat defence mode, windows open at 6am, closed by 10 with blinds and curtains down, with paper taped to the windows to reflect the sun, then retire to the coolest room.
But I suspect cancelling those flyers and others gives them a bit of breathing space for an already-stretched fleet. The flyers are an easy target to cancel as they're a recent introduction to the timetable and probably haven't registered with travellers so much yet.

 

[Llandudno]

Well here in the S Yorks part of Northern-land, yesterday I had the house in full heat defence mode, windows open at 6am, closed by 10 with blinds and curtains down, with paper taped to the windows to reflect the sun, then retire to the coolest room.
But I suspect cancelling those flyers and others gives them a bit of breathing space for an already-stretched fleet. The flyers are an easy target to cancel as they're a recent introduction to the timetable and probably haven't registered with travellers so much yet.

and are hardly likely to be ‘registered with travellers yet’ if they keep cancelling them…!

 

[Purple Train]

I'm currently on the 10.15 Plymouth to Paddington and, while the temperature in here is pleasantly cool, 800309 really didn't seem to like going up Hemerdon... unless there was a speed restriction of course.

The auto-announcer at Plymouth is already warning of delays after Reading due to a speed restriction, but at least conditions are tolerable and it's not as if a 15-minute delay is unheard of.

 

[TheLastMinute]

The Red warning area has been extended to include Dorset, Hampshire and Sussex and extended to 2359 on Thursday.

Last updated: 10:45 (UTC+1) on Wed 24 Jun 2026

Reason: The warning has been extended south across Dorset, Hampshire and Sussex as confidence in extremely high temperatures and humidity has increased in these areas. The warning end time is now the end of Thursday.

Edit: And as expected, an Amber warning has been issued for all day Friday covering eastern and central England up as far as Manchester and Hull.