LNER Hot Weather warning (also Avanti and GWR)

Avanti- Tickets dated Tuesday 23 June can be used at no extra cost (and without changing them) to travel on Monday 22 June, or on any earlier Avanti West Coast service on Tuesday.;
Tickets dated Wednesday 24 June can be used at no extra cost (and without changing them) to travel on Tuesday 23 June, or on any earlier Avanti West Coast service on Wednesday.;
Tickets dated Thursday 25 June can be used at no extra cost (and without changing them) to travel on Wednesday 24 or Friday 26 June, or on any earlier Avanti West Coast service on Thursday.;
If you no longer wish to travel, Avanti West Coast tickets dated Tuesday 23, Wednesday 24 or Thursday 25 June will be eligible for a full refund from where you bought your ticket.

GWR- are requesting ESSENTIAL TRAVEL ONLY on Wednesday and Thursday- Tickets dated fir Wednesday 24 and Thursday 25 June can use them to travel on Monday 22, Tuesday 23 and up to and including Friday 26 June.
Also stopping patterns on some commuter routes are being adjusted, with some stops transferred to long distance trains which have better air con.

Heritage Lines- The Gloucester & Warwickshire Steam Railway, Severn Valley, Bluebell and West Somerset have all cancelled mid week services, and/or are substituting steam with diesel due to the fire risk. Other lines may follow.

Thank you, Stuart. Unfortunately I am supposed to get myself to Essex (from Reading) on Wednesday for an all-day outing on Thursday (tower bells). I was hoping it would be postponed, but so far no such luck :-)

I was planning to take the (air-conditioned, I think) Elizabeth Line from Reading to Shenfield. I don't see anything on the TfL website yet. Is that where I should look for information about the Elizabeth Line as it gets closer to Wednesday?

Thanks for any help!!

Yes, the Elizabeth Line is air conditioned, so look on the TfL website, beyond Shenfield to wherever in Essex it'll be Greater Anglia.

So far Greater Anglia have no updates, but as the week wears on I would expect them to start to feel the strain- https://www.greateranglia.co.uk/service-updates, and haunt their journey check page- https://www.journeycheck.com/greateranglia/

Also National Rail have a good rolling news page on the hot weather- https://www.nationalrail.co.uk/service-disruptions/hot-weather-20260617/

When the train pops out of the tunnel past Liverpool Street you are on Greater Anglia metal, so if they have issues, so will the Elizabeth Line.

If there are issues maybe think about changing at Stratford onto Greater Anglia. The fast GA trains are 15 minutes from Stratford to Shenfield compared to 35 on the Elizabeth line.

I've got spots of rain and overcast in the Lake District, as I write this.

So the issue is train cars not being air conditioned, versus the heat buckling the rails and disrupting service?

The big worries for train companies are infrastructure failures- buckled rails, electrified overhead lines sagging/falling down, points/switches failing etc.

As far as passenger comfort I'd rather be on a train such as the Class 156 we have 'up north' with opening windows, rather than relying on Air Con- on older units if we hit the forecast temperatures it'll be operating past design limits. Modern units like the Elizabeth Line and all Greater Anglia trains should be fine.
But that's why GWR have swapped stopping patterns, to get as many people as possible onto the newer trains with better air con. Some of their older fleet will be struggling, and the emergency opening hopper windows will only do so much.

Down south there are few (if any) trains left with opening windows.

In the North of England we are handing out free bottled water at staffed stations. In London all major National Rail stations have free water fountains- so keep filling up your bottles.

TfL update just in, by e-mail-

Customers travelling on the afternoon of Tuesday 23 June, and on Wednesday 24 and Thursday 25 June are advised to check before they travel and to consider if their journey is necessary, as some rail and Tube services may be disrupted due to the very high temperatures forecasted this week. London Overground and Elizabeth line services are likely to be most affected. Customers who need to travel are advised to consider travelling at quieter times, to allow more time for their journey, and to carry water with them. London buses are expected to run as normal.

Thank you so much, Stuart, for the updates.

Yes, I was thinking A/C for my personal comfort (interesting to know about the design limits on older trains!), but I was also wondering about the rails buckling. I'll have to make a decision soon!

Meanwhile my town in the SF Bay Area is a lovely 22ºC (high temp this week). My brother is in Rome and says it's fine (so far), but I can't take the heat like he can.

Thanks again!

Laura,

This morning (Tuesday) only the relief lines are open between Reading and Paddington- the fast lines are closed. So a 4 track railway is trying to squeeze onto a 2 track railway - widespread delays of 30 to 45 minutes, some cancellations including on HEx (which is halved in frequency).

Not clear if this is due to the heat. the thunderstorms, or an earlier points failure at Southall.

Don't forget the Elizabeth line has no toilets on board.

I'd just be getting on whatever train is first out of Reading, then whatever works across London to Liverpool Street (Circle- currently cancelled, District in either direction, H and C, Elizabeth, bus or even taxi), then whatever is next out of Liverpool Street, be it Greater Anglia or Elizabeth Line.
The system should still be able to cope with such swapping around, and still only charge £20.20 Off Peak, £34.30 Peak.

Thank you so much, Stuart! I came here to add that I had revised my plan and was thinking of making it a day trip (& not staying at my friend's house in Essex Wednesday night) in order to travel early in the morning. 7.14am or 7.24am Eliz line (if it's running) out of Reading, which gets me to Brentwood by 9am.

But I will write down your itinerary. Extremely helpful – as is the reminder of no toilets on board Eliz line!!

Some GWR services in the Thames Valley have been changed to reduce movement of points.

In particular the Didcot to Paddington service which normally has a few stops between Reading and London for example at Maidenhead & Slough will be running non stop from Reading to avoid it changing from the relief to the main line. (In general disruption like this morning it is turned round short at Reading).

Interesting about limiting the movement of points ... and I've heard of the tracks buckling in the heat.

I'm curious what other countries do that routinely have extreme heat – India, say, or in the Middle East. Or Arizona, or Mississippi. Do they use a different type of steel for the rails?

I've never thought about it before, but now I'm wondering. Ah, a quick Google search confirms that there is a dizzying variety of materials/alloys used for steel rails. Fascinating! This is an interesting article from Union Pacific.

You pre-stress the rail to a certain temperature range- https://permaquip.co.uk/news/2025/04/10/permaquips-quick-guide-to-rail-stressing-and-the-hsm70-stressor/

So in a hotter (or colder) climate the rail will be pre-stressed differently. But, also rather than using continuously welded rail (huge long stretches of rail) in the old days you had much shorter stretches of track, so it would be a much shorter piece of track that would expand, and each joint between rails could basically be an expansion joint. If you hear the old "clackety clack" as you are on a train that is you going over each joint, something you don't get with CWR.
So rails in Norway or Finland with extreme winter cold will be stressed differently.

When the transatlantic railroads of the US were built a lot of the steel was actually imported from the UK. An utterly irrelevant fact is that the fastest ever sea passage from the UK to Seattle (pre Panama Canal days) is claimed to have been a shipment of rails from Workington (the town next to me- until the 3rd quarter of the 20th century a huge exporter of rails around the world)- which is said to have been used on the current (post 1981) Empire Builder route to Seattle in WA over Stevens.

It may be that the US freight railroads have much less CWR.

It is a similar story for the overhead wires on electrified lines- they are constructed differently depending where in the world you are, which is why the OHLE in the UK can't stand the extremes of hot and cold temperatures, or high winds it does in other countries. Even if the rails withstand the heat the collapse of the overhead wires is a big risk this week. Some lines will be running at reduced speed to forestall it, putting less pressure on the wires.

This is all quite technical, beyond my knowledge base really.

I hope you get to ring, Laura

when I was working trains (driving in UK parlance, engineer in US) in South east California we were always watching for warped or spread or sprung rails in high heat.

I remember seeing a photo of a spread-caused derailment in an early part of my training

I was monitoring Laura's train this morning- the 0714 Abbey Wood from Reading ran exactly to time throughout, as did the Shenfield connection out of Paddington (having started there). The following 0724 had been pre-cancelled before 10pm last night- which I had informed her of at midnight.
It was the GWR long distance trains which have been delayed all day due to being on the wrong lines.

As I write there is one westbound running 95 minutes late due to a problem at Twyford, but that issue looks to have cleared (it seems to have been a train, not an infrastructure problem), so there should now be service recovery. Two following westbound Elizabeth line trains were turned short at Maidenhead and Paddington respectively and a 3rd held at Ealing Broadway- which ended up running under a minute behind the delayed train.

Thank you, Nigel ! I hope so, too.

Stuart, the information about train tracks is very interesting. Thanks for all the info! And thank you SO much for your help with this hopefully-not-ill-fated journey tomorrow. I'll come back and report how it goes! VERY helpful to know to check for updates the evening before!

UPDATE : Friday 26 June 9pm – I'm not being allowed to post a new reply (!! – anyone know why?) so I'll put this here and hope Stuart and Stacie see it. Stacie, I hope you get to London today without too much hassle!
and Stuart – thank you SO much for your advice. I had a lovely day on the outing and an uneventful, rather enjoyable journey across London in both directions – the 7.14am out of Reading, to Brentwood, and the 19.26 from Shenfield back to Reading. A train to Heathrow that was supposed to leave Hayes & Harlington around 9pm was cancelled, but that was the only carnage I personally witnessed.

I’m at the LNER lounge in Edinburgh waiting for the 12:00 train to London. Unfortunately, I didn’t get the memo- or read your post until this morning- I’ve been too busy having fun on my 13 day RS tour. Hoping the heat won’t cause too much trouble for the employees and passengers.

Luckily the PI County Hall has AC. It seems like whenever I travel to the UK the heatwave follows me.

I’m at the LNER lounge in Edinburgh waiting for the 12:00 train to London.

Or you were before the short notice cancellation owing to heavy delays on the inbound train following a lightning strike at Prestonpans. The 1200 started at Newcastle.

Hope the steward(ess) got you to make a new seat reservation on the 1230 Aberdeen to KGX.

This is when travelling in 1st class is very useful, to get spare seats when two trains become one. But oh dear, a reduced 1st class food offering as well.

Don't forget to claim delay repay- depending how late you get to London you will get at least 1/2 of your ticket price back- if you eventually get there over an hour late it's a 100% refund- https://www.lner.co.uk/support/delay-r

The 12:00 was cancelled and I couldn’t get on the 12:30. Gonna try for the 2:00. I just need to get to London sometime today.

Thanks for the info about refunds. They’ve just told me to try getting on any train that’s leaving.

Stacie,
You are entitled to 100% compensation because even if you had got a seat on the 1230 train it arrived at Kings Cross at 1735- 33 minutes late, so your own delay would have been 78 minutes late.
Thus the fact that you ended up on an even later train isn't really relevant.

Stuart,
Thank you for your help and always keeping the forum aware of train troubles. I used the link you provided and submitted my request for a refund. The email I received said they will review my case and get back to me within ten days.

The ticket barriers were open to let everyone out quickly at King’s Cross so my ticket was never scanned. It was definitely an experience. I felt bad for the attendants on the train. They were taking a lot of flack from people. One poor girl was just trying to hand out water and got caught in a seat dispute. They wanted her to settle it. I made sure to thank them when I finally got off. I found them to be very kind and helpful. They were just trying to make everyone more comfortable. They certainly didn’t deserve any grief for a situation that was completely out of their hands.

UPDATE : Friday 26 June 9pm UK time (now it's Sunday afternoon in California – for some reason the forum wasn't allowing me to post a reply a few days ago when I was in England, so I added an update to my previous post. Seems to be fixed now!)

Stacie – glad you made it!

Stuart – thank you SO much for your advice. I had a lovely day on the outing and an uneventful, rather enjoyable journey across London in both directions – the 7.14am out of Reading, to Brentwood, and the 19.26 from Shenfield back to Reading. A train to Heathrow that was supposed to leave Hayes & Harlington around 9pm was cancelled, but that was the only carnage I personally witnessed.

Laura, I'm pleased all went well. All day Friday both Heathrow Express and the Elizabeth Line were massively disrupted due to issues in the tunnels, and T5 station was effectively closed all day.

I'm going to mention it here (as a search shows it has never been mentioned on the forum, so let's rectify that) there is a WW2 Museum open Saturday and Sunday afternoons only at North Weald Airfield- the former RAF North Weald. As well as the RAF, Squadrons of the Norwegian Air Force were based there during WW2.
The fun way to get there is on the Epping-Ongar preserved railway to North Weald Station (the former Ongar extension of the Central Line).
The publicity of the Museum is minimal- not least in late June the website still says closed for winter, re-open Easter 2026.

On most days the railway is open heritage buses connect from Shenfield and Epping Railway Stations.

I'm glad that worked out

Thanks, Stuart, for your invaluable help! And what a relief that I avoided Friday's disruptions!
Thanks also, Nigel!

& Stuart – thanks for adding to this thread the information about the North Weald Airfield. At the cafe onsite there were some photographs and information about the Norwegian squadrons posted there during WWII (the boys look impossibly young!), but I'd love to see the actual museum sometime (as would my husband, who has been to Duxford, Bottisham, etc.). Definitely a hidden gem! The Epping–Ongar preserved railway sounds great, too.

(sorry to bump this to the top again, b/c the UK heat wave is (for now) over, but I just wanted to thank everyone, and it took me a while to recover my wits :-) )

Don't apologise- the heat wave is not over (!!!)- it's going to be 31C / 88F in London today.

b/c the UK heat wave is (for now) over

Its BBBAAAAAACCCCCKKKKKK

I'm sitting in the only coolish place in my house, 2 feet in front of a portable air conditioner. Set at 24, it has struggled all day and and is just holding 25.7. 31 outside, not a cloud in the sky. The official Yellow Weather Warning doesn't come into effect until tomorrow. Expected to peak on Thursday at 33, then lower until Tuesday when we start Heat Wave Number 4.

all temp degrees C

I want to thank Stuart again for helping me get a refund for my cancelled train. I received an email today that my refund was approved and it has already been applied to my credit card.

I hope everyone manages to stay cool and safe during the heatwave.