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THOUSANDS of people’s travel plans were thrown into chaos yesterday as rail problems delayed almost 70% of trains travelling along the east coast.
With the Champions League final taking place at Wembley and Take That playing a concert in Sunderland, there couldn’t have been a worse time for the problems to strike, with operators warning of delays of up to two hours.
Network Rail investigators were last night trying to establish the cause of damage to four power lines, forcing the cancellations of services in both directions between Grantham, Lincolnshire, and Peterborough, Cambridgeshire.
The problems started at 10.20am, when the first train was stopped approaching Grantham. Altogether 70 out of 102 services travelling the east coast route in both directions were affected.
Trains leaving Newcastle going south suffered few delays but were unable to go past Grantham, while people hoping to return to the North suffered the biggest delays to the start of their journeys and were only able to reach Peterborough.
Between the two towns there were no trains. Instead, to get to London, passengers were being advised to get off at Doncaster as Cross Country, Grand Central and East Coast were all accepting each other’s passengers, making an alternative route possible. Another alternative was to head north into Scotland then travel down the west coast instead. An East Coast spokeswoman said: “I don’t think many people have taken that option to go north. We were advising of a 120 minutes delay, and recommended that people don’t travel. But their tickets are valid for the next day.” East Coast decided to cancel the 9pm train from London Kings Cross to Newcastle yesterday because Network Rail wanted to take possession of the line to fix the problem as quickly as possible. They were expecting to solve the problem overnight and finish the work by 9.30am today, with only the 8am service from York potentially cancelled to avoid a backlog of stranded passengers.

The Dollywood theme park in Pigeon Forge has a new ride that park namesake Dolly Parton is "plain scared" to ride.
In Nashville, famed for records and rhinestones, the raucous downtown honkytonks are prepared to serve cold beer and hot songs.
But with gasoline flirting at $4 a gallon, will tourists come this summer?
Tennessee boasts of being within a day's drive of 65 percent of the U.S. population. The state has no beaches like Florida, few museums like Washington, D.C., and no casinos like Las Vegas.
Nevertheless, tourism officials are optimistic Tennessee's convenient location will pay off in travel dollars during the key vacation months that unofficially begin Memorial Day weekend.
"We see people coming here who could have gone on further," said Kim Davis, spokeswoman for the Knoxville Tourism & Sports Corp.
"Gas is just gas," said Steve Smith, owner of Tootsie's Orchid Lounge in Nashville. "People won't stay home."
Dollywood's new Barnstormer uses two pendulum arms to swing riders through a red barn at 45 mph and 81 feet into the air.
"It gives you the sense of weightlessness at the apex," park spokesman Pete Owens said. "It's like a very robust backyard swing."
Dollywood will have four festivals the rest of the year as a way to keep the customers coming.

The best spot to watch a parade, when to arrive at the park, how to save money on food without skipping meals.
These are just a few of the topics that Bee readers weighed in on when I asked for cost- and sanity-saving tips regarding Disneyland travel.
As many families (mine included) head to the Happiest Place on Earth for spring vacations or to experience the opening of two rides June 3 The Little Mermaid Underground Adventure in California Adventure and the newly redesigned Star Tours in Disneyland it's time to share.
Megan Smith's advice is from a trip she and her husband took to Disneyland with their grandchildren more than 20 years ago, but the Fair Oaks couple's suggestion still rings true.
"We told them ahead of time that 'everyone' sees Disneyland this way: We go first thing in the morning and stay through lunch time eat lunch at the park. Then we all go back to the motel room and take a rest Grandma and Grandpa too!" she wrote. "Then we eat dinner (outside the park) and then go back to the park until closing."
Given that "everyone" was doing it, Smith's elementary-age grandchildren bought into the plan.
"The results were very happy after the first electric light parade, most people and their very tired kids left the park. No lines, cooler weather, no lines, and our grandchildren were not tired or whiny because they had napped in the afternoon (and did I mention no lines?)" she said.
Richard and Becky Brandt of Citrus Heights have found that bringing in bottled water and plastic containers of soda helped trim their Disneyland costs. (While outside food and beverages are discouraged, plastic bottles containing nonalcoholic beverages are permitted, said John McClintock, senior publicist for Disneyland.)