A power failure in Manchester has forced widespread cancellations of rail services across northern England, leaving passengers stranded and operators scrambling to restore timetables.

The outage cut electricity supplies to key rail infrastructure in the Manchester area, one of the busiest rail hubs outside London. The disruption spread quickly across the northern England network as trains could not run through the affected corridors.

Operators cancelled services on multiple routes as the failure took hold. Cancellations were reported across northern England, with Manchester at the centre of the disruption. Passengers faced delays and journey cancellations throughout the affected area.

The incident underscores how dependent the northern England network is on the power supply feeding the Manchester rail hub. A single point of electrical failure was sufficient to trigger cancellations across a wide swathe of the region's services.

Rail operators advised passengers to check before travelling while engineers worked to identify and repair the fault. The extent and duration of the cancellations depended on how quickly power could be restored to the affected infrastructure.

Recovery efforts focused on re-energising the failed supply and then restarting services in a controlled sequence across the northern network. Until full power was confirmed, operators held trains rather than risk sending them into sections where the traction supply remained unstable.

Further updates from the operators and infrastructure managers are expected as the situation develops, with passengers advised to expect continued disruption until the fault is fully repaired and normal timetables resume.