India train crash kills more than 280 Serious train accident in India – at least 50 dead and hundreds injured

After one of India’s worst train accidents, the death toll has risen to 288. In addition, several hundred injured passengers were treated at various hospitals in Odisha state, a railway spokesman said on Saturday.

The disaster happened on Friday evening around 7 p.m. local time (3 p.m. CEST) in a rural area of ​​Balasore district, over 200 kilometers southwest of Kolkata (formerly: Calcutta). Two passenger trains and a freight train crashed one after the other on two parallel track sections. How exactly, even hours after the accident, was still not clear.

According to media reports, one of the two passenger trains probably derailed first and the other then crashed into the wagons left on the tracks on the parallel route a few meters away. Which of the two trains derailed first and for what reason initially remained unclear – as did whether the freight train was actually parked on another track at the time of the accident and was rammed by one of the derailed passenger trains, as some media described. Others gave different versions of what happened.

By daybreak on Saturday, the magnitude of the disaster became more apparent. About a dozen car wrecks lay on and off the tracks, steel behemoths rose up, some with ripped compartment ceilings and shattered windows. On and off the wagons, dozens of plainclothes helpers and rescuers in orange protective suits desperately tried to rescue injured passengers from under the heavy rubble.

An eyewitness told local television station NDTV that he was shaken from his sleep when his train suddenly derailed – and chaos ensued. “10 to 15 people fell on me,” he told the broadcaster. He himself escaped with injuries to his neck and hands, but then saw corpses and severed body parts everywhere.

“It was a deafening sound, I felt the ground shake under my feet. Our train was tossed around,” a passenger told the Times of India newspaper. Then he looked out the window and saw the derailed wagons with people trapped under them. “It was dark and I heard screaming.” Another man described how distraught relatives later searched for their loved ones in a field of mutilated bodies “The sight was too horrible to describe.”

Railway minister Ashwini Vaishnaw told ANI news agency that he had ordered an investigation into the cause of the train crash. He arrived at the scene of the accident on Saturday morning to get an idea of ​​the magnitude of the tragedy. Prime Minister Narendra Modi was shocked and wrote on Twitter: “In this hour of grief, my thoughts are with the grieving families.” Saturday was declared a day of mourning in Odisha.

Shortly after the accident, the Prime Minister’s Office announced compensation for the next of kin of 200,000 rupees (2,267 euros) each. The injured should therefore receive 50,000 rupees each. Railway minister Ashwini Vaishnaw also promised Rs 1 million in compensation to the families of the dead. According to the information, the seriously injured should receive 200,000 rupees each and the slightly injured should receive 50,000 rupees each.

Federal President Alain Berset expressed his condolences to those affected on Twitter. Switzerland offers its condolences to the families of the victims. Thoughts are with the bereaved.

India’s ailing railway system with old trains and tracks in need of a facelift is notorious for frequent accidents. More than 100 people have died in serious rail accidents in India in recent decades, including the Kanpur 2016, Valigonda 2005, Rafiganj 2002, Gaisal 1999 and Khanna 1998 accidents.

The Seenigama accident in neighboring India, Sri Lanka, is considered the worst railway disaster in history. On December 26, 2004, the tsunami wave hit a fully occupied express train and killed about 1,800 people.

(oli/cst/sda/dpa)