East Coast Trains announced tickets for travel on Thursday would be valid on Friday. But late on Thursday night hundreds of rail passengers were still stranded.
In Newcastle some elderly, disabled and pregnant passengers were ferried into special buses while East Coast trains attempted to find remaining passengers accommodation.
The chaos continued outside as the growing number of passengers caused traffic to become gridlocked, hindering alternative routes home. Flash flooding meant taxis, coaches and trains could not reach Newcastle station.
Meanwhile, passengers frustrations mounted as nearby hotels became full, leaving many facing the prospect of a night on the still-damp station concourse.
At 10pm the platform was still full of passengers unable to find anywhere to stay.
Special cases such as schoolchildren from two distant schools were found coaches, but few vehicles could make their way to rescue the others in the station.
"My train was cancelled, and when we got to Newcastle station it was a river," said Peter Bowie, at IT project manager from Seaham, Co Durham.
"All the trains were cancelled, all the trains going north had turned around.
"My family were trying to come and get us, but the roads are all flooded as well. They had to turn around even though they were only 5 miles away."
Pat Ransley, a great-grandmother from Edinburgh, was left on Newcastle station for 6 hours waiting for transport.
She had meant to travel on the 13:10 from Doncaster but it wasn't until 9.30pm that a taxi took her out of Newcastle station.
"We stayed on the train for a long time waiting," she said.
"We were given no information ... there was a communication fault because of a lightening strike."
Jill Beaton, 79, from Milnathort, Central Scotland, should have been home at 5.30pm but was still waiting for assistance at midnight.
"They told me at first there would be buses, but they turned around because they couldn't get to station because of the water," she said.
"I don't see any alternative to staying here in the station. It's possibly comfortable with the help of my luggage."
Late on Thursday night East Coast attempted to arrange an emergency taxi to Stirling so she could sleep in a hotel.
A Network Rail spokesman said officials hoped to have a "limited service" operating midmorning on the West Coast Main Line.
But he warned services on the east coast would remain disrupted for much of Friday.
"It is really tough out there," he said. "For those travelling on the East Coast line I would check before you travel."
An East Coast spokesman added: "Due to the extent of the landslip caused by flooding near Spittal, just south of Berwick-upon-Tweed, services will still not run between Edinburgh and Newcastle on Friday.
"We apologise to our customers for the inconvenience and are ensuring engineers are working to fix the line quickly, but it is unlikely to reopen until Saturday morning.
"However, we are hoping to run limited shuttle services between Berwick and Edinburgh throughout Friday."
He added: "And, whilst we can't guarantee buses, we are doing all we can to arrange alternative transport between Berwick and Newcastle where possible. Our advice to customers travelling to and from Scotland is to do so on Saturday instead, during which their tickets will be valid.
"We anticipate a full service will operate from London to Newcastle and London in both directions from Friday morning."
The disruption came as 48 flood alerts were put in place across the Midlands, North East and North West.
The violent storms claimed the life of a pensioner near Ludlow, Shropshire, who was swept away by floodwaters.
Witnesses described seeing Michael Ellis, 66, carried away by the flood after he was forced to abandon his 4x4 near his home. Friends said the former headmaster had been returning from the doctor when a brook burst its banks at the village of Bitterley.
In parts of Herefordshire and Worcestershire, an inch of rain fell in less than an hour. In Leicestershire cars were dented as hailstones the size of golf balls fell shortly after 1pm.
In the North West and Midlands, there were also reports of "dirty rain" covering cars and pavements with orange dust thought to have been carried from the Sahara. Stephen Davenport, the forecast manager at the MeteoGroup weather service, said parts of Britain including south-east Wales, the Midlands and eastern England had seen "the most severe weather imaginable in this country".
The cause of the extreme conditions, Mr Davenport said, was a "Spanish plume" — when hot air from Spain is forced northwards and meets cooler air sweeping in from the west, causing "super cell" thunderstorms, more commonly seen in the "Tornado Alley" area of Colorado.
In contrast to the North, the South enjoyed summery clear spells and 82F (28C) heat. Friday is expected to bring a mixture of clear skies and light showers, with temperatures reaching a high of 70F (21C) in London and the South East.
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