All cross country services suspended 23/08/26

[RT4038]

Will there be any consequences for XC for being unable to run a service because of poor business decisions?

No, thought not

Consequences for whom?

XC to DfT - we need to spend £1m on improved Business Continuity Plan/infrastructure. Dft to XC - Er, no. .....

 

[Furryanimal]

I am booked to travel from Leicester to Newport on Monday on two Cross Country services.
There are quite a few other Glamorgan cricket fans returning from here to South Wales tomorrow
Hope the trains are running tomorrow morning.

 

[Bletchleyite]

There are back up phone numbers, but control don't have access to any of the IT systems required to run a service.

How is it that they can't VPN in from laptops at home or in Starbucks? It's 2026.

 

[AdamWW]

Consequences for whom?

XC to DfT - we need to spend £1m on improved Business Continuity Plan/infrastructure. Dft to XC - Er, no. .....

I haven't seen anything in this thread to suggest that we can assume that whatever happened (and we don't really know what) couldn't have been avoided in any way without a huge financial outlay.

Was BR just as brittle but it's just with poorer communications things like this happened without people generally being aware?

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: Sunday at 20:40 ==

How is it that they can't VPN in from laptops at home or in Starbucks? It's 2026.

Perhaps because there's more to it than just a power failure.

 

[Russel]

Quite agree, and using a shared building in itself adds unknown risk

How many other significant issues has it caused that have been detrimental to train operation since XC first started using Cannon House 20 years ago?

 

[bahnause]

How is it that they can't VPN in from laptops at home or in Starbucks? It's 2026.

Probably because it is 2026 and VPN for business is (or should be) dead by now? If they are using Laptops at all. Many of our multi screen and phone setups wouldn't work with a laptop.

 

[Bletchleyite]

So you have a duplicate facility, maybe sitting there gathering dust until needed (yes you can rent places but there is still an ongoing cost and it takes longer to get going), or you can use both. But now you have 2 buildings to pay for, 2 sets of IT kit to upgrade/patch (you must keep them in sync) not to mention regular DR testing.

It is 2026. In 2026 this sort of thing is cloud based and people access from laptops from home.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: Sunday at 20:45 ==

Probably because it is 2026 and VPN for business is (or should be) dead by now? If they are using Laptops at all. Many of our multi screen and phone setups wouldn't work with a laptop.

This is simply not true of any part of the IT industry I have experience of (and this is my job).

Laptops and VPNs or cloud services are a key part of almost any business's resilience plans. Fire alarm? Go to Starbucks.

 

[AlterEgo]

It is 2026. In 2026 this sort of thing is cloud based and people access from laptops from home.

Many railway systems you use on a daily basis in Control are not cloud based.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Many railway systems you use on a daily basis in Control are not cloud based.

Then VPN provides your connectivity.

I have one word for this, and it's "negligence".

 

[MalaiseForever]

Realistically XC and AWC should be up at Saltley with NR and WMT.

There’s no space for additional controllers and it’s just been refurbed for WMT, so pigs will fly before that happens.

 

[Dood75]

RTT showing allocations for tomorrow so assume all up and running again at HQ

 

[GoneSouth]

Consequences for whom?

XC to DfT - we need to spend £1m on improved Business Continuity Plan/infrastructure. Dft to XC - Er, no. .....

I knew the answer already

Basically XC are quite happy with shoddy (cheap) working practices, and just gamble that this kind of thing rarely happens, the DfT won’t do anything because it would cost money to fix, passengers are very unhappy because although XC have the highest fares on the network, the company is run with the business sense of the school tuc shop.

What a mess

 

[Harpo]

I have one word for this, and it's "negligence".

My one word is still ‘unknown’. Unless of course anyone’s added some facts since this morning?

 

[ThreeIfByAir]

Probably because it is 2026 and VPN for business is (or should be) dead by now? If they are using Laptops at all. Many of our multi screen and phone setups wouldn't work with a laptop.

How else do you get employees onto a secure network that other people can’t access?? Even if it’s in the cloud and/or at a remote data center, you need to secure the path from someone’s phone/tablet/laptop to the business data.

Heck, I even have a VPN in my house to get to servers there…

 

[Bletchleyite]

My one word is still ‘unknown’. Unless of course anyone’s added some facts since this morning?

If a business has an IT outage that means they can't conduct any part of their business for an entire day then they have not planned properly.

A degraded form of business is not unusual (eg Monzo has an entire duplicate degraded operation they can kick in, which they've used twice), but this was way beyond that.

The last time I experienced this sort of outage in a business was about 2004 and I thought it negligent then. In 2026, bar a major hacking incident, it's inexcusable. But the railway does love living in the past.

 

[KHCT]

Will there be any consequences for XC for being unable to run a service because of poor business decisions?

No, thought not

Which "business decisions" are you referring to? Who do you think made these decisions?

 

[Gareth1990]

Would I be correct in thinking this is some sort of cyber attack? It certainly sounds like one

 

[Snow1964]

Cross Country website now updated with following

Significant disruption to CrossCountry services on Sunday 23 August​

Services across the CrossCountry network have been significantly disrupted on Sunday 23 August due to a power cut affecting our control centre

A full CrossCountry service is expected to operate on Monday 24 August

Apparently full service expected Monday (I can't remember last time XC ran a full service with not a single cancellation, anyone know how long ago it was)

Tickets purchased for travel on CrossCountry services on Sunday 23 August will be valid for travel on CrossCountry services up until Wednesday 26 August. Original tickets will remain valid for travel.

Although this says tickets can be used on XC, it doesn't say what happens if you have a connection to / from XC train. Because it only says Cross country services, it seems to exclude connections using other operators on Mon-Wed

Travel Information | CrossCountry Trains

www.crosscountrytrains.co.uk

 

[johnnymo]

So does anyone actually know what happened, also how come Peterborough to Stansted continued to operate (short of declaring UDI or defecting to Greater Anglia)_

 

[Dave61]

Would I be correct in thinking this is some sort of cyber attack? It certainly sounds like one

I don't think so, this from the BBC:

CrossCountry to provide full service after major disruption

CrossCountry says its "key priority" is now restoring as close to a normal service as possible.

www.bbc.co.uk

Train operator CrossCountry will run a full train service on Monday following major disruption to services across the country.

The operator said it plans to run a "very limited number of trains" from around 18:00 BST on Sunday evening, and a full service on Monday.

It comes after a power outage affected its control centre in Birmingham, resulting in mass cancellations across the network on Sunday.

A CrossCountry spokesperson said: "Our key priority is now to restore as close to a normal service as possible for our customers tomorrow."

They added: "With most facilities now reinstated, we are planning to operate a very limited number of services from around 18:00 this evening, primarily on routes towards Leicester and Derby.

"Planning is underway to support a full train service on Monday and we are working closely with National Grid and industry partners as recovery efforts continue.

Following the power cut, an update from National Rail at 18:13 BST said the CrossCountry service between Peterborough, Cambridge and Stansted Airport will be running on Sunday evening.

The update also said the operator had been able to resume operating an hourly train service from Birmingham New Street to Leicester and Derby.

Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander said: "Following earlier disruption on CrossCountry services, I am pleased to hear some trains are set to run tonight, and a full timetable expected to resume tomorrow.

"While passengers should continue to check their journeys before they travel, I'd like to thank engineers who are working tirelessly to minimise disruption as much as possible.

"We are setting up Great British Railways and nationalising services, including Cross Country next year, to end decades of fragmentation and vulnerability on our network. We are determined to give passengers the reliability they deserve."

The National Union of Rail, Maritime and Transport Workers (RMT) has called for a review of railway operational control centres following the disruption, "to ensure they remain unaffected by power outages."

 

[Starmill]

Monzo has an entire duplicate degraded operation they can kick in, which they've used twice

That wouldn't work for me at all during the approximately four hours it was up for while I was trying to do something with it. Typically the failure was when I did want to use my account to make a payment.

This is more acute with Monzo because they don't provide any in-person or telephone services. Also from some journalists and tweets a number of other users were also unable to make any payments. I was able to view stale balances but not receive or make payments. I'm considering complaining actually, as it could have been very bad. Luckily I avoided economic losses.

 

[Bletchleyite]

That wouldn't work for me at all during the approximately four hours it was up for while I was trying to do something with it. Typically the failure was when I did want to use my account to make a payment.

This is more acute with Monzo because they don't provide any in-person or telephone services. Also from some journalists and tweets a number of other users were also unable to make any payments. I was able to view stale balances but not receive or make payments. I'm considering complaining actually, as it could have been very bad. Luckily I avoided economic losses.

If it didn't actually allow payments (they claimed it did) then that's unacceptable.

 

[Starmill]

If it didn't actually allow payments (they claimed it did) then that's unacceptable.

Some users were able to make them, I've no doubt. I wasn't, though.

 

[bahnause]

How else do you get employees onto a secure network that other people can’t access?? Even if it’s in the cloud and/or at a remote data center, you need to secure the path from someone’s phone/tablet/laptop to the business data.

The broad, unconditional network access that old VPNs allowed is too dangerous for large organizations. Instead, enterprises have migrated to Zero Trust Network Access architectures (like Microsoft Entra)

 

[Adrian1980uk]

If a business has an IT outage that means they can't conduct any part of their business for an entire day then they have not planned properly.

A degraded form of business is not unusual (eg Monzo has an entire duplicate degraded operation they can kick in, which they've used twice), but this was way beyond that.

The last time I experienced this sort of outage in a business was about 2004 and I thought it negligent then. In 2026, bar a major hacking incident, it's inexcusable. But the railway does love living in the past.

Working in the IT industry, all businesses have business continuity plans as I'm sure cross country have but ask anyone who actually does the job how practical they are, you'll get some interesting answers. I agree there should be backup plans but we should not sit in our ivory towers and believe this is isolated to the railway industry.

 

[QueensCurve]

Due to a power failure at the head office and control center in Birmingham, all XC trains look to have been removed from the timetable today. Services aren't showing as cancelled on any screens, rather they have been completely removed.

Attached, a photo of the special notice stating the issues at bristol temple meads

Innteresting online rant by a gentleman here.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Working in the IT industry, all businesses have business continuity plans as I'm sure cross country have but ask anyone who actually does the job how practical they are, you'll get some interesting answers. I agree there should be backup plans but we should not sit in our ivory towers and believe this is isolated to the railway industry.

Just about the easiest one is having all PCs issued as laptops and a VPN or similar to access services. Almost all businesses got this during COVID if they didn't have it before.

 

[D6130]

Would I be correct in thinking this is some sort of cyber attack? It certainly sounds like one

It's only a couple of days since Comrade Putin said that the UK would pay for continuing to supply weapons and drones to Ukraine.

 

[GoneSouth]

Probably because it is 2026 and VPN for business is (or should be) dead by now? If they are using Laptops at all. Many of our multi screen and phone setups wouldn't work with a laptop.

II don’t know what you’re using but VPNs are very much in use to secure connections back to your company workplace or cloud.

Which "business decisions" are you referring to? Who do you think made these decisions?

Business decisions the lead to an outage at 1 office completely disabling your business. Sounds like bad planning to me, whatever the cause.

 

[Dave61]

Just about the easiest one is having all PCs issued as laptops and a VPN or similar to access services. Almost all businesses got this during COVID if they didn't have it before.

Not everyone has the benefit of VFH and many places still insist on Office working with deskbound PC's, and for many companies resiliance/duplication is a dream.

As for resiliance what do you do when the cloud takes a nap, of Microsoft Teams (if you use it) takes a lie down (taking out phones as well)? Many companies reply on these so much now (along with AI but lets steer clear of that rabbit hole) and when they fail everything stops. At my last job before retiring the mantra was Cloud! Cloud! Cloud! (before coming AI! AI!), no desk phones (all Teams), even email in the cloud, I do wonder what they do when it all falls over or a JCB takes out the lines to a manufacturing plant (you can't take an assembly line home with you)

Sometimes with the way everythings is getting interconnected I wonder that we have so few outages