Eurostar returns to full service

Eurostar had to delay the launch of a direct Ashford to Brussels service

Eurostar is due to restart a full service through the Channel Tunnel for the first time since a fire last year.

Work to repair fire damage cost over £60m and was completed on 10 February. Eurotunnel shuttle and freight trains have already returned to full capacity.

Eurostar said it had taken longer to return to full service because of the need to implement a new timetable.

A new direct service from Ashford to Brussels, delayed from December because of September's fire, will now start.

The high-speed trains between London and Paris and Brussels will also run through the tunnel at 100% capacity again, with a maximum of four per hour.

See layout of Channel Tunnel

A maximum of six freight trains, which run between Folkestone and Calais, can also run each hour.

The fire on 11 September broke out in a lorry on a freight train seven miles from France and took 16 hours to extinguish.

A total of 32 people on board had to be led to safety, with 14 suffering minor injuries.

A section of the tunnel known as Interval 6 was damaged, causing all services to stop for two days before one of the two tunnels was reopened.

The Channel Tunnel has suffered several incidents since it opened to traffic in 1994, although only one - a fire in 1996 - caused major injuries.

That fire caused £200m worth of damage and burned for more than five hours, wrecking the concrete lining and facilities over about half a mile of tunnel.

In August 2006, 34 people had to be led to safety after a fire broke out on a lorry being carried on a freight train.