Passengers on a train stranded between stations after a power failure were to be evacuated, said Southeastern.

A failure of the electrical supply in Sturry resulted in a train becoming stuck.

Network Rail engineers found they were unable to make the repairs required to allow the train to move on.

Passengers who had already been waiting on the repairs were told they were being evacuated.

One passenger tweeted: I"m currently trapped on a train between Canterbury West and Ramsgate - we’ve been sat still for nearly an hour…. engineers were meant to be here over 20 minutes ago…

"Please give us a proper update as there are many children and pets trapped on this service!!!"

Another posted: "Wow @Se_Railway 3 hours stuck on a train less than 1000m from Canterbury West station and you couldn’t get water to your passengers! Tut tut that’s not good! 3 hours delay for a uk power network cable scorching your trac, surely you can do better than that!"

The electrical fault also caused delays and cancelled services with no trains running between Ashford and Ramsgate, via Canterbury West.

The power outage was first reported just before 6.30pm.

Southeastern shared an update reading: "Network Rail are unable to move the train stuck near Sturry, so we are making plans to safely evacuate the stranded service."

At about 9.10pm, it said the stranded trains had been moved.