THOUSANDS of homes in the region were left without power early yesterday when thunderstorms brought chaos to the North-East and Yorkshire.

Commuters faced disruption after lightning strikes caused delays to tens of thousands of people.

Lightning bolts hit train lines near Darlington and the torrential rain caused flooding in tunnels on the Tyne and Wear Metro system.

Trains on the East Coast mainline were brought to a halt for two hours after lightning struck signals north of Darlington.

A spokeswoman for Network Rail said the lightning bolt put out all signals and caused problems with overhead lines between Darlington and Newton Aycliffe at about 5.15am.

Arriva, GNER and Virgin services were held at York and Newcastle until engineers tackled the problem, causing delays of up to half an hour.

Services were running as normal by 7.30am, the spokeswoman said.

Nexus, which runs the Tyne and Wear Metro, said storms had caused chaos when a tunnel flooded and electrical points were hit.

A spokesman said: ''There was major disruption this morning, which could not have happened at a worse time.

''Fortunately, almost all the services were back on by 8.30am.''

Shuttle services were introduced on parts of the network which links Newcastle and Sunderland.

About 25,000 homes lost electricity across the North, but worst-hit was County Durham.

Chris Rees, of the Press Association Weather Centre, said the storms had been caused by a change from warm conditions to slightly cooler ones which are expected over the next few days.