West Midlands grinds to a halt

Dangerously icy roads, widespread delays on the trains and hundreds of flights cancelled - travel chaos continued across the West Midlands today after some of the worst winter weather seen in years.

The Christmas getaway remained in chaos for thousands, with flights continuing to be cancelled or delayed at Birmingham Airport, while commuters faced nightmare journeys after the weekend's heavy snowfall turned into ice.

Trains across the region were also delayed, buses were only sticking to main roads because of treacherous conditions.

Workers at Midland Metro worked round the the clock keeping trams running through the night to ensure ice was kept away from the tracks and overhead power lines.

It follows chaos on the country's transport network, which ground to a halt when the West Midlands got around 5in of snow in a few hours on Saturday morning which was far heavier than forecast.

At Birmingham Airport, all flights were suspended on Saturday afternoon until around 6.30pm, and disruption continued throughout yesterday and into today, with hundreds of passengers' festive travel plans in tatters.

Passengers bedded down at the airport overnight, only to find that on Sunday morning flights were cancelled to Alicante, Paris and Poland.

Wolverhampton builder Steve Meyrick was involved in a holiday jet sit-in after his mercy dash to the hospital bedside of his critically ill sister was grounded by the weather yesterday.

The 51-year-old, from Compton, and his catering engineer brother-in-law Terry Clowsley of Tettenhall had booked on the Ryanair 737 to Tenerife at the last minute after Mr

Clowsley's wife Wendy, 47, had a heart attack on the sunshine island late on Friday and is now on a ventilator.

She was on holiday with her three children and mother Beryl celebrating the 21st birthday of her eldest child Daniel when disaster struck.

Mr Meyrick and his brother in law were among around 40 passengers who refused to leave the plane when told the trip had been aborted after spending over four hours sitting on board on the tarmac at Birmingham International Airport.

Police were called and the protestors were finally persuaded to disembark around around 8.15pm last night, seven hours after boarding the jet.

Mr Meyrick and his brother in law were hoping to fly out of Liverpool on another Ryanair jet later today.

A planeload of passengers was stranded on Birmingham Airport's runway for more than seven hours.

The Pakistan International Airlines flight boarded passengers to fly to Islamabad due to leave at 9.30am yesterday, but it did not take off until 4.40pm.

Melissa How, aged 21, a retail assistant, of Digbeth, Birmingham, was at the airport for a flight to Alicante in Spain with her flatmate Rocio Argamasilla, 24, to spend Christmas with her family.

Her flight was cancelled and she said she could not find another one until December 26.

She said: "We came here the night before the flight, because the flight was supposed to be at 6.30am and we wanted to make sure we weren't held up on the train and we didn't trust ourselves to get up that early, so we slept at the airport.

"We are too tired to be angry. They told us nothing."

She said the family would have been able to get a refund on the cancelled flight but were upset because they wanted to go home for Christmas.

Trains were still disrupted today after a weekend of chaos on the tracks. London Midland, which runs services through Birmingham Snow Hill, Walsall, Stourbridge, and

Wolverhampton, was today advising passengers not to travel unless it was absolutely necessary, and said the severe weather means all its services are subject to delay and cancellations.

Bosses at the AA and RAC admitted the weekend was their busiest of the year, with more calls than at any other time.

A crash in freezing conditions added to drivers' misery on the M5 this morning. A van collided with a car between Junction 2 at Oldbury and 1 at West Bromwich.

Two lanes of the southbound carriageway were temporarily closed while the wreckage was cleared just after 6.40am.

The motorway was badly affected on Saturday night, when thousands of motorists were left in long queues for at least four hours after a lorry jack-knifed.

The northbound motorway between Junction six for Worcester and Junction 3 for Halesowen reopened at 10.30pm, leaving cars stuck in jams of more than nine miles.

Drivers stuck in queues on the M5 took to micro-blogging site Twitter to express their frustration.

One motorist told how it had taken him more than six hours to travel about six miles between junction six to Junction 5.

Tim Prevett twitted: "M5 one big ice rink. Feel sorry for what must be 1000s of folk stuck northbound."

Another wrote: "Gave up and came home. No Xmas presents delivered."

And Stephen White tweeted: "Now I'm not moving on the M5 and haven't moved more than 200 yards in four hours."

An articulated lorry pulling a trailer jackknifed on the A4036 Pedmore Road, by the Merry Hill Shopping Centre, causing delays on Saturday at around 1pm.

Cars struggled along Castle Hill, in Dudley, Caledonia and Thorns Road, in Quarry Bank, Racecourse Lane, in Stourbridge, and the A458 Windmill Hill and Colly Gate, in Cradley, Halesowen.

Fire crews from Dudley were called to the aftermath of a crash at the Flood Street Island at the junction of Blackacre Road and Dudley Southern Bypass in Dudley.

Two women were trapped by their injuries in a Peugeot 306 when it was hit side on by another vehicle around 12.05pm on Saturday.

Firefighters said the other car involved had left the scene by the time they arrived. There were also major delays between Kingswinford and Stourbridge as cars struggled to negotiate an icy slope on the canal bridge at Camp Hill, Wordsley.

Drivers left their own cars to help push stranded vehicles clear of the main road.

Carpet fitters Steve Taylor, aged 42, of Wollaston, and Dave Jones, aged 50, of Wollescote, were among those caught up in the chaos.

They managed to pull their van into a side road and made two trips to carry first the underlay and tools and then a 13ft roll of carpet on their shoulders from Marine Crescent to George Street, Wordsley, 400 yards away.

Elsewhere, police closed a "very treacherous" Windmill Lane in Castlecroft, Wolverhampton, after a six-car collision on Saturday at around 12.08pm. There were no injuries."

A car crashed into a traffic light in Wolverhampton Road, Walsall, at about 2.20pm yesterday. No-one was injured in the smash.

A Mercedes van came off the M6 at Junction 11 at about 11am yesterday.

It left the motorway and went down the embankment, rolling onto its side.Two people in the van were out of it when firefighters arrived, and were uninjured.

Bosses at the AA said they had received 800 calls an hour across the entire country on Sunday and said sub-zero temperatures and ice were causing hazardous conditions on the region's roads

Edmund King, AA president, said: "Our patrols have reported a lack of grit in many areas particularly on some key regional routes.

"We urge the Highway Authorities to plough and grit as many roads as possible so that we can keep Britain moving.

"We are experiencing more road closures and blockages caused by jack-knifed trucks or trucks stuck in the snow."

Staff at the AA's Emergency Contact Centre in Oldbury were being ferried into work by managers using additional 4x4 vehicles loaned to the rescue company by Ford, Subaru and Land Rover to ensure operations continued.

Motorway police also used 4x 4 vehicles to collect officers for duty.

The RAC brought in extra patrols and call centre staff to cope with the deluge of calls over the weekend.

The emergency services were also pushed to their limits.

The hotly anticipated Black Country derby clash between West Bromwich Albion and Wolverhampton Wanderers in the Premier League was called off on Sunday because of the weather.

National Express West Midlands said it was operating as many bus services as possible, but that they would have to stick to main roads.

On Saturday the firm announced that it had "difficulty operating" many bus services in West Bromwich, Pensnett and parts of Birmingham, and most of the bus services into Wolverhampton city centre were cancelled.

It meant many shoppers and workers were left to walk home on icy footpaths when their buses failed to turn up.

Bus services found it difficult to access Rowley Regis hospital yesterday, and drivers were trying to operate as close to the hospital as possible.

The number 300 bus route between Worcester, Stourport and Kidderminster was also cancelled yesterday due to the weather.

Chiltern Trains, which runs a service between Birmingham Snow Hill and London Marylebone, implemented a reduced timetable over the weekend and continued the reduced services today as a result of the severe weather.

Midland Metro staff volunteered to work through Saturday night to run ghost trams' along the tracks to keep ice away from the points and overhead power lines.

The work meant that the Metro could offer a full Sunday service along the whole length of the route, and was operating as normal today.

But the Severn Valley Railway managed to keep moving despite the snow to run its annual Santa Specials service on the Kidderminster to Bridgnorth line.

All local authorities insisted gritters were sent out on Friday night, Saturday and Sunday to make the region's roads safe.