A busy tube line descended into chaos on Wednesday morning, causing severe delays in a city that will host the Olympics in under a month.

The problem, coming just three weeks before the London Underground starts coping with huge numbers of Olympic commuters, happened on the Northern line.

northern line

No love for the Northern Line: Bob Crow accused Boris Johnson of leaving services "on a wing and a prayer with no plan B"


Transport for London's (TfL) website warned passengers: "Severe delays are occurring while we fix a signal system failure."



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If you didn't have to use the Northern Line this morning, perhaps you would like to torture yourself with this instead?

Bob Crow, general secretary of the RMT transport union, said: "This is one of the worst Tube breakdowns this year and, just weeks from the Olympics, shows that the cuts to maintenance driven by TfL and (London Mayor) Boris Johnson have left services on a wing and a prayer with no plan B."


BBC London Travel
looks like the entire Northern Line is suspended this morning due to a 'signal systems failure' - lending true meaning to the Misery line j

There were also minor delays on the Underground's Metropolitan line in the morning peak. This was due to a signal failure at Finchley Road.

London Underground operations director Nigel Holness said: "The Northern line has severe delays due to a power supply issue affecting the signalling system.

"Our engineers are on site investigating and working hard to fix the problem.

"We apologise to customers for the delays this has caused."

Commuters took to twitter to vent their anger, see a selection of their thoughts below:

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  • Tom Edwards

  • Coral Summers

  • LBC 97.3

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  • Anna Adams

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  • Ian Thompson-Corr

  • Christopher

  • Misha Tobin

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  • BBC London Travel