In one of the deadliest rail accidents in recent memory, two passenger trains and a goods train collided in the Indian city of Balasore, resulting in over 200 fatalities and hundreds of injuries.
Train crash in India: After the accident in eastern Odisha state on Friday, state chief secretary Pradeep Jena reported on Twitter that at least 233 people had died and 900 had sustained injuries.
During a press conference, Jena stated that the death toll would increase as troops conducted a large-scale rescue operation.
In the photos taken at the scene, rescuers searched for survivors inside a wrecked rail vehicle. The video also showed scattered inverted coaches and people climbing a broken train car across the tracks.
According to authorities, more than 115 ambulances and several fire service units participated in the rescue effort on Friday. According to Jena’s tweet, 500 units of blood were collected overnight, leaving 900 units on hand.
“This will support the care of accident victims. The man wrote that I owed a debt of gratitude to every volunteer who gave blood to support this noble cause.
Jena told CNN affiliate News18 that the cause of the tragic crash is still under investigation and emphasized that the immediate priority is ongoing rescue efforts.
“We are only working (at) sending additional doctors, ambulances, and buses, so all those things we are doing so we have not thought of asking what happened, how it happened,” he claimed.
What is known
According to Indian police, one passenger train crashed into the coaches of another passenger train that had already derailed and been thrown onto the opposing track, resulting in a fatal accident.
Then both trains crashed.
Jena reported a terrible accident near the Bahanaga railway station in the Balasore area involving the Coromandel Express, a cargo train, and another passenger train.
Approximately 10 to 12 coaches of the 12841 Coromandel Express, a train between Shalimar and Chennai, derailed and were subsequently thrown onto the opposing track. After some time passed, a train traveling between Yesvantpur and Howrah slammed into those already wrecked coaches, derailing three to four of its own, according to Railway Spokesperson Amitabh Sharma.
Between Kolkata, the capital of West Bengal, and Chennai, a city in South India, the Coromandel goes through India’s east coast.
On Friday, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi sent a condolence tweet. “Upset about the train crash in Odisha. My thoughts are with the grieving families during this difficult time. The author expressed the wish for a quick recovery for injured people. They mentioned that rescue operations are underway at the accident site, and the injured individuals receive all possible support.
outdated infrastructure
The massive rail network in India has deteriorating infrastructure and insufficient maintenance, which are frequently to blame for accidents.
The number of fatalities from Friday’s catastrophe has now eclipsed that of one of the deadliest crashes in recent memory, which occurred in 2016 and claimed over 140 lives in a derailment in northern Uttar Pradesh state.
About 16,431 persons died in approximately 18,000 railway accidents nationwide in 2021. According to the 2021 report by the National Crime Records, most railway accident cases, specifically 67.7%, were classified as “Fall from trains/collision with people on track.”