Airline passengers risk missing flights due to train disruption from Luton stations

Thousands of airline passengers risk missing their flights due to train disruption into London.

Operator East Midlands Railway says the delays are due to multiple signalling failures causing disruption on services running between London St Pancreas and Luton Airport.

Network Rail, which is responsible for rail infrastructure, said the fault is related to work over Christmas to install a new system to control signals.

Thameslink services to and from the airport are also affected, with many trains cancelled or severely delayed.

The rail services are expected to be disrupted for the rest of Wednesday 27 December.

Thameslink issued an alert to passengers which said: "Please do not attempt travel between Bedford and London Bridge until further notice.

"Due to the level of disruption, passengers are advised to delay travelling until later.

"If you do decide to travel, you will need to use alternative means on some or all of your journey, and you will need to allow an additional 60 minutes to travel."

Gary Walsh, route director for Network Rail, said: “I am very sorry that our engineering work is affecting passengers today.

“There is a fault with part of the signalling control system which means we need to reduce the number of trains which are able to run.

“Siemens signalling engineers are working to restore a reliable system as soon as possible.”

A depot was also affected, causing delays to trains due to operate early morning services.