Hundreds reportedly trapped for over 12 hours on VIA Rail trains due to storm

A treacherous winter storm that hit southern Ontario hard on Friday — interrupting air travel and causing havoc on the highways — has apparently significantly disrupted rail travel on a number of passenger trains.

CityNews has received numerous reports of a VIA rail passengers travelling between either Ottawa, or Montreal, and Toronto that have become stuck near Cobourg, Ont. for over 12 hours.

Multiple people posted on social media saying at least one train had been stranded with hundreds of people on it after sustaining damage from falling trees.

“VIA hasn’t done anything yet and people are running out of food and drink,” says Mitchell Wright in an email, who says his brother is on the train. “They won’t let people off the train due to the weather.”

Wright says a tree fell and smashed the windshield, forcing the trip from Ottawa to Toronto to come to a halt.

The reports have been corroborated by a number of Twitter users and callers to the CityNews newsroom, with several people saying at least two other VIA trains are also stranded and waiting for the damaged train and trees to be cleared.

A second VIA train heading in the same direction was reportedly forced to stop behind the damaged train. Other users reported a third VIA train travelling to Ottawa also became stuck because a power outage had forced both directions to share a single track through that stretch.

Hannah Sabuelba boarded a train in Montreal around 4:45 p.m. on Friday. As of early Saturday morning she was still stuck on board the train that had originally been scheduled to depart for Toronto at 3 p.m. the day before.

Speaking to CityNews around 8 a.m. Saturday, she says food was running out on board and the toilets on the train were not working.

“There are families here, kids here, and everyone is kind of using their coats as blankets and trying to get some shut-eye,” Sabuelba says.

The passengers started receiving announcements around the Kingston area warning of possible delays ahead.

“We heard multiple things like a loss of signal due to the weather, we also heard there was traffic,” she says. “Around 3 a.m. they said a tree had fallen on the tracks which needed to be inspected by a team of engineers.”

Sabuelba says passengers received another update later in the morning that the current inspection crews needed to be replaced by a second team of engineers.

“At this moment I don’t know entirely why there’s been such a delay,” she says. “Not much has been explained.”

She says staff on board has been handing out any remaining food throughout the morning.

“At one point they were distributing all the remaining sandwiches,” she says. “That was at 12 a.m. and I was under the impression we would be in Toronto by 1 a.m., so I declined that.”

Passengers were told just after 8 a.m. Saturday that the train would be moving into Cobourg in the next half hour but would continue to make frequent stops until arriving in Oshawa. They were told the train would be able to resume typical speed from Oshawa to Toronto.

CityNews has reached out to VIA for comment but has not heard back.

Provincial police pleaded with motorists to stay off the roads on Friday as the winter storm caused numerous disruptions on roadways. OPP say up to 100 vehicles were involved in multiple collisions in the southwestern part of the province.

A stretch of Highway 401 was closed in both directions between London and Tilbury, and Highway 402 was also closed between London and Sarnia after a multi-vehicle crash involving more than 50 vehicles in Middlesex County.

The Greater Toronto Airports Authority says nearly 39 per cent of all departing flights from Toronto Pearson International Airport on Friday were cancelled as a result of the winter storm. It says just over 40 per cent of all arriving flights were also cancelled due to the storm.

WestJet cancelled all flights in and out of Pearson from 9 a.m. Friday until the end of the day.