RAIL passengers on South Western Railway services across the south west, including the Weymouth to London Waterloo line, are being warned of major disruption today.

There is currently a severely reduced South Western Railway service running between Woking and Surbiton, due to a power surge in the track circuit system earlier today.

Services that would normally run from Weymouth to London Waterloo have been affected, with services only going as far as Southampton and then back to Weymouth.

That service has since been resumed, SWR said, with trains now running the full journey.

Across the network SWR services have been subject to significant delay, cancellation and disruption, with ticket acceptance and replacement buses in place.

In an update, a spokesman said that Network Rail restored power shortly before 1pm today, so all the lines affected have now reopened.

"We’re still expecting some knock-on disruption until around 5pm," the spokesman said.

This morning the following alterations were made to the service:

1. A reduced service is running through the Woking area

2. Weymouth to Waterloo services will run between Weymouth and Southampton Central, in both directions 

3. Portsmouth to Waterloo services will divert via Effingham Junction, in both directions

4. Salisbury/Exeter to Waterloo services will terminate at Basingstoke

5. Due to the disruption, some train crew will be displaced and other services are also subject to short notice cancellation and alteration

To assist passengers with their journey ticket acceptance has been arranged as follows:

1. Great Western Railway between Basingstoke and Reading, and Reading and Paddington in both directions

2. RailAir services between Woking and Guildford in both directions

A replacement bus service is also running between Woking and Surbiton, in both directions.

A South Western Railway spokesperson said: “We apologise to passengers for the disruption to their journey today and encourage anyone who needs to travel to check our website for the latest information. Network Rail are working hard to fix the signal issues, but unfortunately we expect disruption for most of the morning. Any passenger who is delayed by 15 minutes or more will be eligible to claim Delay Repay compensation and should check our website for more details.”