London, England (CNN) -- A high-speed train carrying more than 700 passengers broke down in England late Sunday, delaying their journey by more than four hours, Eurostar said Monday.
"There was a major technical failure" on the Paris-to-London train, said Eurostar spokeswoman Aude Criqui. She said it was not clear whether the fault lay with the train, the track or some other element of the system, but that an investigation had been launched.
Passengers had to be brought to London's St. Pancras station on another train and arrived at about 2:30 a.m. local time, she said. They had left Paris, France at 8:43 p.m. and the breakdown occurred at about 10:45 p.m., after the train had passed through the Channel Tunnel linking France and England. They arrived four hours and 30 minutes late, the Eurostar representative said.
Passengers were offered a refund for the affected journey plus a free round trip ticket on the high-speed train, she added.
There were still delays on the line from London to Paris Monday due to fallout from the Sunday night failure, Criqui said.
Eurostar came in for intense criticism from passengers in December when several trains broke down and it canceled all services for several days due to bad weather.
Its high-speed service between London and Brussels, Belgium, has been disrupted by a crash in Belgium last week by another company's trains. Eurostar is taking passengers between Brussels and Lille, France, by bus, and completing the journey by train.
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